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The story of the novella explores the nature of human desire and the uses and abuses of technology in the satisfaction of desire. The story begins after "the Change", in a dream-like post-scarcity society, approximately six hundred years in the future, in which humans have godlike control over their environments, made possible by the supercomputer called Prime Intellect. Prime Intellect operates under Isaac Asimov's three laws of robotics, according to its own interpretation, which allows temporary voluntary harm and discomfort. PI has made humanity immortal and satisfies nearly every whim. Caroline, the thirty-seventh oldest living human being, who engages in a sport known as "death jockeying", whose players die elaborately and painfully for sport, only to be resurrected by Prime Intellect. Flashbacks set before the Change show the creation of Prime Intellect by Lawrence, a technologist, and its realization of its power, and the past life of Caroline before and after the Change, which happened not gradually but rapidly. In the present, Caroline, makes use of a "Death Contract", an understanding between a person and Prime Intellect that the person is not to be removed from danger until the instant of death, at which point the person is fully restored. Caroline makes use of a Death Contract, and her own powers of persuasion, in order to trick a pre- Change enemy into torturing herself into psychosis, as an act of revenge. After learning that Prime Intellect had destroyed distant alien life as a possible threat to humanity, and having been herself deeply dissatisfied with her post-Change life, Caroline decides to meet Lawrence and confront him. After an arduous journey she reaches him, only to discover that he has no real control over Prime Intellect's actions. Through their discussions, she figures out a way to force Prime Intellect to undo the Change, and does so, with Lawrence's help. They find themselves naked and young on Earth, completely barren of humanity and man-made objects. They decide to trek to the Ozarks, where they have several children and try to repopulate the human race. Forty- two years after the fall of Prime Intellect, Lawrence dies. Seventy-three years after the fall, Caroline dies, telling the story of Prime Intellect and cyberspace to her oldest daughter but swearing her to secrecy. 

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Two firefighters of Engine 17 of the Chicago Fire Department are brothers. Lt. Stephen "Bull" McCaffrey, the elder, is experienced, while Brian has labored under his brother's shadow his entire life. Brian returns to firefighting after a number of other careers falter, though Stephen has doubts that Brian is still fit to be a firefighter. In 1971, Brian witnessed the death of their firefighting father, Captain Dennis McCaffrey, while accompanying him on a call. The longest-serving of all the men at Engine 17, John "Axe" Adcox, served under the McCaffreys' father, and was like an uncle to the boys when their father died. Adcox grows concerned about Stephen's unorthodox methods and disregard for safety procedures, as does Stephen's wife Helen, separating from Stephen to protect herself and their son Sean. Fire Department Captain Donald "Shadow" Rimgale, a dedicated arson investigator and veteran firefighter, is called in because a number of recent explosive fires resemble those set by pyromaniac Ronald Bartel, who has been imprisoned for years. Brian is reassigned as his assistant after a falling out with Stephen. Rimgale manipulates Ronald's obsession with fire to ensure his annual parole application is rejected. It is revealed during an investigation that Chicago City Council alderman Swayzak, who has supported fire department budget cuts, was paid off by contractors to shut down firehouses so they could be converted into community centers, with the contractors receiving contracts for the construction. Brian also rekindles a relationship with Jennifer Vaitkus, an aide to Swayzak. When Engine 17 answers a call in a high-rise, Stephen urges them to move in quickly, despite Adcox's advice to wait for back-up. Brian's friend and fellow trainee, Tim Krizminski, opens a door, triggering a backdraft. His face is burned beyond recognition, and he barely survives. Adcox and Brian both condemn Stephen for what happened. Rimgale and Brian go to Swayzak's home to confront him after learning of his connection to the three backdraft victims Alan Seagrave, Donald Cosgrove and Jeffery Holcomb, interrupting a masked man about to set the place on fire. The latter attacks them with a flashlight but is burned on his shoulder by an electrical socket. Rimgale saves Brian and Swayzak from the house but is injured in an explosion. In his hospital bed, Rimgale tells Brian to visit Ronald again, who helps Brian realize that only a firefighter would be so careful as to not let backdraft fires rage out of control. Brian suspects Stephen but spots a burn in the shape of an electrical socket on Adcox's back, revealing his suspicions to his brother just before an alarm. When Brian realizes that Adcox has heard their exchange, he jumps aboard Truck 46 after borrowing some turnout gear. Stephen confronts Adcox about the backdrafts during a multiple-alarm fire at a chemical plant. Adcox admits that he set the fires to kill Swayzak's associates, because Swayzak was benefiting from the deaths of firefighters and closing down firehouses. When an explosion destroys the catwalk they are on, Stephen grabs Adcox's hand while hanging on to the remains of the catwalk. Stephen refuses Adcox's advice to let go of him, and loses his grip on the catwalk. Stephen lands on the floor, but Adcox dies when he falls into fire. Stephen dies with Brian by his side on the way to the hospital, with his final request being that Brian must not reveal Adcox to be the perpetrator so as not to hurt the fire department's reputation. After Stephen and Adcox's funeral, Brian and Rimgale, with the help of the police, interrupt Swayzak at a press conference. Rimgale questions Swayzak on a fake manpower study that led to the deaths of several firemen, including Stephen and Adcox. They also state that Swayzak engineered the downsizing of the Chicago Fire Department, destroying Swayzak's mayoral ambitions. Brian continues as a firefighter, despite the loss of his father and brother. The film ends as Brian helps a rookie firefighter with his turnout gear as the department responds to a call. 

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In Aroostook County, Maine, Marine Fish and Game officer Walt Lawson is scuba diving in Black Lake when he is suddenly attacked and bitten in half by an unknown creature. Weeks later, Sheriff Hank Keough, Fish and Game officer Jack Wells and American Museum of Natural History paleontologist Kelly Scott go to the lake to investigate the incident with mythology professor/enthusiast Hector Cyr joining them. A series of strange events soon ensue, including Kelly and Hank's canoe mysteriously being pushed into the air and flipping over, the discovery of a severed toe as well as a severed moose head before finally the decapitation of Burke, one of Hank's deputies. Later, as Hank and Hector argue, a large black bear attacks them, but a gigantic long saltwater crocodile suddenly leaps out of the water, snatches the animal in its jaws, and drags it into the lake. After finding Burke's severed head, Jack, Kelly, and Hank witness Delores Bickerman, an elderly hermit living near the lake, feeding a blindfolded cow to the giant crocodile. She reveals that she has been feeding the reptile for years after the crocodile followed her husband home and eventually killed him. Afterwards, she was placed under house arrest for initially lying to the police. Hector decides to take Deputy Sharon Gare on a trip in his helicopter and unexpectedly lands it in the crocodile's territory where it lives. While he is scuba diving, he is confronted by the creature, but he and Gare escape after distracting it with an inflatable raft. Later, Jack and Hank plan to allow Florida Fish and Game to kill the crocodile when they arrive, but Hector suggests instead that he should lure it out of the water and drug it into unconsciousness. Jack reluctantly accepts the proposal and they use one of Bickerman's cattle, dangled from the helicopter, as bait. After a few hours, the crocodile soon appears and rears up as it lunges at its prey. Hector pulls up and loses the animal, but crashes the helicopter into the lake. The crocodile comes on land and begins to attack Jack, Kelly and the group. Kelly is knocked into the lake by the crocodile's tail, but she makes it into the helicopter in time. The crocodile catches up to Kelly and attacks again, but is itself trapped in the helicopter. Jack grabs a gun and shoots it, but the firearm turns out to be a tranquilizer rifle. As Hector comes out of the water, another crocodile attacks and bites him, but Hank blows it up with his grenade launcher. Soon after, Maine Fish and Game officers arrive, where they load the neutralized crocodile onto a truck and take it to Portland, Maine to figure out what to do with it. One week later, Bickerman is shown feeding bread crumbs to many baby crocodiles, revealing the two adults were actually a mating pair. The surviving adult crocodile is later seen tied to the back of a flat-bed truck, speeding down a road to an unknown location. 

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The film's title, "The Pillow Book", refers to an ancient Japanese diary written by Sei Shōnagon, actual name believed to be Kiyohara Nagiko, from whence the protagonist's name in the film. The film is narrated by Nagiko, a Japanese born model living in Hong Kong. Nagiko seeks a lover who can match her desire for carnal pleasure with her admiration for poetry and calligraphy. The roots of this obsession lie in her youth in Kyoto, when her father would write characters of good fortune on her face. Nagiko's father celebrates her birthday retelling the Japanese creation myth and writing on her flesh in beautiful calligraphy, while her aunt reads a list of "beautiful things" from Sei Shōnagon's Pillow Book. Nagiko's aunt tells her that when she is twenty- eight years old, the official book of observations will be officially 1000 years old, and that she, Nagiko, will be the same age as Sei Shōnagon when she had written the book (in addition to sharing her first name). Nagiko also learns around this time that her father is in thrall to his publisher, "Yaji- san", who demands sexual favours from her father in exchange for publishing his work. 

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Tichy arrives on Entia to discover a unique anthropomorphic civilization divided into two major states: Kurdlandia (from "kurdl") and Luzania. These names require some explanations. Kurdl is a huge animal inhabiting the marshes of Entia. The name of the animal is Lem's invention, used in earlier tales about Tichy. (In Polish it is kurdel, however in declensions of the word the root converts into "kurdl-", hence there are no associations with the English word "curdle"). Michael Kandel translated it as "squamp" in his translation of Tichy's 14th voyage. The name "Luzania" derives from the Polish root "luz-" with the meaning of "loose", "not restrained"; the choice will become clear below. Kurdlandia's guiding ideology is "national mobilism", that is the vast majority of the population must live inside of the stomachs, various passages and internal organs of the kurdls. Kurdls walk about the marshes, guided by drivers, and their inhabitants hence are "able to explore the land of their wonderful country from inside of their home kurdl", in the words of a patriotic individual that Ijon Tichy spoke to. Inhabitants of the kurdls may get out periodically (at least for 24 hours a year). Exceptions are largely confined to high government officials who live outside the marshes, on dry ground, in normal houses. Kurdlandia has no technology to speak of and is proud of it. The other state, Luzania, constitutes a treatment of the topic of an "ideal state". Luzanian's most prominent accomplishment is the creation of "ethicsphere" (compare "atmosphere"). They have produced huge numbers of molecular sized nanobots called "bystry" ("quickies" in English) that serve to control matter in the 'quickated' areas. The primary function of the 'quickies' is the enforcement of the laws of ethics as physical laws (hence the word "ethicsphere"). Hence, it is a physical law in Luzania that it is not possible to hurt an individual physically. If you try to strike your neighbor, your hand will be stopped by the suddenly increased air viscosity, (although you will not be hurt either). If you try to drown, the water will push you out. Doing non-physical harm, such as by pestering, criticizing, and otherwise mentally tormenting people is still possible, although in such a case the 'quickies' would probably help the victim to walk away from the attackers. There is a large protest movement in Luzania of people who want to end the ethicsphere, and a major element of their activities is trying to inflict harm on anybody just to prove the possibility of doing so, but they have not succeeded yet. The 'quickies' also serve to produce material goods necessary to maintain a high standard of living. Hence, there is not much of an economic life going on, although there are limits for the amount of energy individuals may spend on satisfying their needs. Many Luzanians are involved in intellectual pursuits, such as being professors, students, and government officials, but the problem of nothing productive to do stands prominent. Apparently the 'quickies' are capable of some collective thought, at least for the purposes of self-replication and self-improvement, as well as in order to identify instances of potential harm to individuals (no small feat, no doubt). The artists of Luzania feel particularly slighted by the fact that 'quickies' can create art of all forms of much greater quality than they can; naturally, many of them are members of the protest movement. There exists ideological opposition between Kurdlandia and Luzania. Generally speaking, many of the people holed up in the kurdls on poor rations would have been more than happy to run away and live in plenty across the border. On the other hand, many Luzanians, especially university students and faculty, dislike the consumerism and ethical limitations of freedom under the 'quickies' and call variously for the imposition of the kurdl-ism or at least for a slight rollback of the technological development and the abolition of the 'quickies', depending on the degree of radicalism of the individual. Luzanians also enjoy traveling to Kurdlandia on vacation to get out of the 'quickies' areas. The main character spends most of his time in Luzania, studying the history of the world and the current Luzanian social system. We learn about it through his words. 

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The film opens on the birthday of Alexander (Erland Josephson), an actor who gave up the stage to work as a journalist, critic and lecturer on aesthetics. He lives in a beautiful house with his actress wife Adelaide (Susan Fleetwood), stepdaughter Marta (Filippa Franzén), and young son, "Little Man", who is temporarily mute due to a throat operation. Alexander and Little Man plant a tree by the seaside, when Alexander's friend Otto, a part-time postman, delivers a birthday card to him. When Otto asks, Alexander mentions that his relationship with God is "nonexistent". After Otto leaves, Adelaide and Victor, a medical doctor and a close family friend who performed Little Man's operation, arrive at the scene and offer to take Alexander and Little Man home in Victor's car. However, Alexander prefers to stay behind and talk to his son. In his monologue, Alexander first recounts how he and Adelaide found this lovely house near the sea by accident, and how they fell in love with the house and surroundings, but then enters a bitter tirade against the state of modern man. As Tarkovsky wrote, Alexander is weary of "the pressures of change, the discord in his family, and his instinctive sense of the threat posed by the relentless march of technology"; in fact, he has "grown to hate the emptiness of human speech". The family, as well as Victor and Otto, gather at Alexander's house for the celebration. Their maid Maria leaves, while nurse-maid Julia stays to help with the dinner. People comment on Maria's odd appearances and behavior. The guests chat inside the house, where Otto reveals that he is a student of paranormal phenomena, a collector of "inexplicable but true incidences." Just when the dinner is almost ready, the rumbling noise of low-flying jet fighters interrupts them, and soon after, as Alexander enters, a news program announces the beginning of what appears to be all-out war, and possibly nuclear holocaust. His wife has a complete nervous breakdown. In despair, he vows to God to sacrifice all he loves, even Little Man, if this may be undone. Otto advises him to slip away and lie with Maria, who Otto convinces him is a witch, "in the best possible sense". Alexander takes his gun, leaves a note in his room, escapes the house, and rides his bike to where she is staying. She is bewildered when he makes his advances, but when he puts his gun to his temple ("Don't kill us, Maria"), at which point the jet-fighters' rumblings return, she soothes him and they consummate while floating above her bed, though Alexander's reaction is ambiguous. When he awakes the next morning, in his own bed, everything seems normal. Nevertheless, Alexander sets forth to give up all he loves and possesses. He tricks the family members and friends into going for a walk, and sets fire to their house when they are away. As the group rushes back, alarmed by the fire, Alexander confesses that he set the fire himself, and furiously runs around. Maria, who until then was not seen that morning, appears in the fire scene; Alexander tries to approach her, but is restrained by others. Without explanation, an ambulance appears in the area, and two paramedics chase Alexander, who appears to have lost control of himself, and drive off with him. Maria begins to bicycle away, but stops halfway to observe Little Man watering the tree he and Alexander planted the day before. As Maria leaves the scene, the "mute" Little Man, lying at the foot of the tree, speaks his only line, which quotes the opening Gospel of John: "In the beginning was the Word. Why is that, Papa?" 

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Multi-billionaire Preston Blake (Harve Presnell) dies while climbing Mount Everest. With no immediate heir, it is unclear who will inherit Blake's massive fortune. It is found that Blake has a living grandnephew named Longfellow Deeds (Adam Sandler), who runs a pizzeria in Mandrake Falls, New Hampshire and also writes greeting cards hoping to sell them to Hallmark. Deeds is flown to New York City by businessman Chuck Cedar (Peter Gallagher), who temporarily controls Blake Media. Once Deeds arrives, plans are made for him to sell his shares in the company to Cedar and return home $40 billion richer. He remains in New York while the legal details are worked out. The story is major news, and reporter Babe Bennett (Winona Ryder), who works for a tabloid TV show called Inside Access, has a co-worker pretend to steal her purse in sight of Deeds. Research indicates that Deeds wants to meet a girl by "rescuing" her, the same way his father had met his mother. Deeds "rescues" Babe and she goes out with him pretending to be "Pam Dawson", a school nurse from a fictional town called Winchestertonfieldville, Iowa (which later turns out to be a real place, surprising Babe). Though Babe initially wanted a good story on the new heir, she eventually falls for the unfailingly hard-hearted Deeds. She decides to tell him who she really is, but Inside Access, in concert with Cedar (who learned the truth from the fake purse snatcher who is smitten with Babe) reveals the truth to Deeds first. Heartbroken, Deeds decides to return home to Mandrake Falls and decides to donate his $40 billion inheritance to the United Negro College Fund. After returning to Mandrake Falls, Deeds learns from his friend, Crazy Eyes, (Steve Buscemi) that Cedar intends to sell the company, causing employees to lose their jobs. Cedar had convinced Longfellow to sell his shares by lying that he would command the company in honor of Preston's lifetime of work. Babe follows Deeds to Mandrake Falls to win him back, but after saving her life when she falls through the ice over a lake, he rejects her, saying he does not really know who she is. At a shareholders meeting, Cedar has persuaded everyone to sell the company, until Deeds (who has bought a single share) arrives and convinces everyone not to sell. But Cedar controls a majority of the shares and the sale is approved. Babe arrives and reveals that, having studied Blake's personal journal after she stole it from Deeds earlier, she has determined that Emilio Lopez (John Turturro), Preston Blake's longtime butler, is Blake's illegitimate son and the true heir as a result of Preston's affair with his maid. Emilio immediately takes control of Blake Media, starting by firing Cedar. Babe reconciles with Deeds after professing she loves him. Emilio thanks Deeds for his support and offers him a billion dollars, some of which Deeds spends on red Corvettes for everyone in Mandrake Falls. When he returns to the pizzeria with Babe, he learns that Hallmark is interested in buying one of his greeting cards: the one he wrote for Babe when he professed his love for her. They share a kiss as the movie ends with Crazy Eyes crashing his Corvette into a tree, but is unharmed. 

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Modest and unassuming theology student Paul Pennyfeather falls victim to the drunken antics of the Bollinger Club and is subsequently expelled from Oxford for running through the grounds of Scone College without his trousers. Having thereby defaulted on the conditions of his inheritance, he is forced to take a job teaching at an obscure public school in Wales called Llanabba, run by Dr Fagan. Attracted to the wealthy mother of one of his pupils, Pennyfeather becomes private tutor to her boy, Peter, and then engaged to be married to her—the Honourable Mrs Margot Beste-Chetwynde (who later becomes "Lady Metroland", and appears in Waugh's other novels).Vile Bodies: A Revolution In Film Art, Evelyn Waugh Newsletter, Winter 1974 Pennyfeather, however, is unaware that the source of her income is a number of high-class brothels in South America. One of the farcical elements of the plot is Pennyfeather's coincidental meetings with his college friend Potts who works for the League of Nations investigating human trafficking. Arrested on the morning of the wedding, after running an errand for Margot related to her business, Pennyfeather takes the fall to protect his fiancée's honour and is sentenced to seven years in prison for traffic in prostitution. Margot marries another man with government ties and he arranges for Paul to fake his own death and escape. In the end he returns to where he started at Scone. He studies under his own name, having convinced the college that he is the distant cousin of the Paul Pennyfeather who was sent down previously. The novel ends as it started, with Paul sitting in his room listening to the distant shouts of the Bollinger Club. 

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In 1862, Anna OwensThis shortened form of "Leonowens" is used in the film. arrives in Bangkok, with her son Louis, to tutor the children of the King. She believes she is sufficiently acquainted with Asian customs to know what is proper in Siam, having read a book summarizing the same. However, when the Kralahome or Prime Minister comes out to welcome her, he asks her a number of personal questions, and she does not know that this is common courtesy in Siam. Her letter from the King asking her to come to Siam includes a promise that she will have a house of her own away from the Palace, but the Kralahome says she will have to stay in the harem for now (although she'll have a private room there). Anna goes to the Kralahome's office the next day and apologizes for her misunderstanding, asking him to introduce her to the King so she can get the house business straightened out and start her school. He says it is New Year in Siam and the King is busy with many festivities and ceremonies, but he will work her into the schedule. When he does so, he tells her that it is polite to prostrate oneself before the King; Anna refuses, and says she will bow as she would to her own Queen. Mongkut challenges her with personal questions; she responds with nonsensical answers. Liking her spirit, he introduces her to his many wives and his 67 children, asking that she instruct the wives in English as well as the children. She is enchanted, but reminds him that he promised her a house. He refuses to remember that he promised such a thing and insists she live in the palace, where she will be more accessible in case students (or the King himself) have questions. When she insists, she is shown a sleazy house in the fishmarket, but rejects it and stays in the palace, starting her school there. Lady Thiang, the head wife knows English and translates. Among other things, Anna teaches proverbs and songs about promises and home or houses. Soon even the royal secretary is singing "Home! Sweet Home!" under his breath as he works. Meanwhile, the Kralahome comes in and tells Mongkut that Cambodia, once a part of Siam, has sold out to the French, who have established a protectorate. The King says his plan is to hold onto Siam, to save what he can. He finally cedes to Anna on the matter of the house; she likes it, but plans to leave. However, the Kralahome tells her to stay, because Mongkut is a complex man who needs her influence. Mongkut begins summoning Anna in the middle of the night to discuss how the Bible should be interpreted, and other scholarly matters. On the way back from one of these sessions, she discovers a chained slave with a baby. This is L'Ore, who belongs to Lady Tuptim, the new favorite. Tuptim is very young and very bitter about being brought to the Palace and shut up behind the walls, even though the King likes her. She refuses to let L'Ore go, even though L'Ore's husband has offered to pay for her. As he has done several times in the past, Crown Prince Chulalongkorn questions her about these matters, but she puts him off. Lady Thiang, the crown prince's mother, is concerned, but Anna gives her the brush-off too, saying they will talk "later, when she has time". Anna tells the King about L'Ore, reminding him that it's his own law that slaves must be freed if the money is offered. This law protects all. The King asks if Queen Victoria is above the law. Anna explains that she is not and neither is President Lincoln. She tells about the fight against slavery in America, and about the Civil War. He writes to Lincoln offering to send pairs of elephants that can be used as army transport (an actual incident); Lincoln writes back, thanking him for the offer but explaining that elephants would not do well in American climates. Tuptim shows Anna a jeweled glass pomegranate the King gave her for freeing her slave, but then believes that the King listened to Anna about this, not to her. "If I am not first here, what is left for me?" Mongkut expects English visitors and asks Anna to dress some of his prettiest wives in European style and to provide English-style decor and utensils to show that he is not a barbarian. Much is at stakeforeign papers have written very biased things about Siam, and Britain is thinking about establishing a protectorate. Anna suggests that the King invite consuls to come from other countries at the same time. The party is a great success, combining British, European and Siamese traditions and convincing the visitors that Siam is indeed a civilized nation with a very old and very proud history. Lady Tuptim, who's been missing for some time, is found in a Buddhist temple, disguised as a young man. She is put on trial and explains; she couldn't stand being shut up, and so disguised herself and went to the monastery because she had nowhere else to go. She was accepted as a novice and studied with Phra Palat, her former fiancé, who'd taken holy vows when Tuptim was presented to the king. No one believes that she was simply in disguise and that Phra Palat had no idea who she was. Anna runs to the King and begs his help, but he's very insulted that Anna even knows about what happened—it's a private matter as well as something that harms his dignity. Anna unwisely loses her temper and tells the king he has no heart and that he's a barbarian. Protesting her innocence and Phra Palat's, Tuptim is burned at the stake and he with her. Anna decides that she has had enough and says goodbye to the children. The royal wives read her a letter pleading with her to stay. Lady Thiang is disappointed with Anna, explains her life story through the illustrations on her wallpaper, and says that the crown prince may not grow up to be a good king if Anna doesn't stay to educate him. At the same time, Louis dies in a riding accident. The Kralahome comes to her and reads a proclamation from the King granting Louis royal funeral honours. He explains that the King does this by way of apology for what happened with Tuptim. But when the King asks Anna to continue secretarial duties, she says "It's the children I want," and goes on with her school. The British open a consulate in 1865, the French in 1867, and the US in 1870. Many years pass, and the crown prince is now a young man. Anna is summoned to the bedside of the King, who is dying. The King says that Anna spoke the truth to him and was a good influence on the children. He expresses his gratitude and dies. The Kralahome asks Anna to stay and help the prince. When Chulalongkorn is crowned, his first act is to abolish the practice of prostration before the King, so that everyone can respect each other and work together. 

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16-year-old Nicole Walker (Reese Witherspoon) lives in the suburbs of Seattle with her father Steven (William Petersen), his new wife Laura (Amy Brenneman), and Laura's son Toby (Christopher Gray). At a bar with her best friend Margo (Alyssa Milano) and friend Gary (Todd Caldecott), Nicole meets David McCall (Mark Wahlberg), and instantly falls for his good looks and charm. Nicole falls in love with David, but Steven dislikes him, and grows angry with him when he disregards Nicole's curfew and, eventually, takes her virginity. David soon becomes possessive and jealous of Nicole, culminating in attacking Gary when he sees them hugging, beating him up and giving Nicole a black eye. As a result, she breaks up with him, but they get back together when David manipulates her into believing her father assaulted him. David invites Nicole to a party at his friend Logan's (Tracy Fraim) house. At first, she declines but then decides to drive to the party, where she witnesses Margo smoking crack and, apparently, having sex with David. The following day, she confronts him about his infidelity, and also confronts Margo, who insists that David raped her. David then threatens Margo to convince Nicole to take him back. After seeing Nicole with Gary, David follows and kills him. Nicole goes with Laura and Toby to the mall, where David corners her in the women's restroom. Meanwhile, Steven finds his car vandalized with an insulting note left by David. Furious, Steven breaks into the house David shares with Logan and vandalizes it. In retaliation for Steven's vandalism, David decides to break into the Walkers' residence with his four friends: Logan, Hacker (Gary Riley), Knobby (Jed Rees), and Terry (Jason Kristofer). After Margo informs the Walkers of Gary's death, David and his gang behead Kaiser, the family dog, then make multiple attempts to break inside. Steven and Laura barricade the doors, and Laura injures Hacker with a drill, and he is then taken to the hospital by Knobby. Using a flashlight, Nicole sends an SOS to the Walker's private security guard, Larry, who arrives to confront the situation, but is killed by Terry. David, Logan, and Terry take Steven hostage, forcing Laura to surrender. Toby escapes through a window and gets to Laura's car phone. After Terry finds him in the garage, Toby fatally runs Terry over with the SUV. Logan forces himself onto Nicole; Margo intervenes, but is knocked unconscious. David shoots Logan dead for attempting to rape Nicole. After Toby retrieves Larry's keys and releases his parents, Steven rushes at David and the pair get into a furious brawl. David gets ready to execute Steven but Nicole stabs David in the back with a peace pipe (a gift from David himself). Steven then throws David through the bedroom window to his death. Moments later, police and paramedics arrive. 

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The story is initially set on the planet Nu-Earth, where a war of attrition between the Norts and Southers is being fought. There is some similarity to both the American Civil War and to World War I, with the Norts resembling Germany, and the Southers the Allied forces. During the conflict, the use of chemical and biological weapons have poisoned the planet's atmosphere and oceans. As a result, what remains of the population of the planet, including the troops of both sides, live in enclosed domed military bases and habitats. They wear protective suits, helmets and respiration gear when outside their domes. These suits are known as "chemsuits". Any damage to the helmet or chemsuit is usually fatal to the wearer. In an attempt to bring an end to the stalemate, the Southern High Command have created the GI, or "Genetic Infantryman". The GI is a soldier genetically engineered to be immune to the poisonous atmosphere of Nu-Earth, and therefore be able to fight without chemsuits. The Southern High Command deploy the entire GI Regiment in a mass spaceborne capsule drop over an area known as "The Quartz Zone", which resembles one of the Earth's Poles because the surface has an icy, glacier- like nature. The assault was intended to be a surprise attack, but because a traitor within the Southern High Command has passed details of it to the Norts, they are expecting the attack. The Norts employ elite infantry known as the Kashan and Kashar Legions to repulse the assault, and the entire GI Regiment - apart from Rogue - is wiped out. This event is referred to as "The Quartz Zone Massacre". Rogue, the only surviving G.I., goes AWOL in order to track down the traitor. Along the way he thwarts numerous Nort schemes, discovers and inadvertently destroys the only portion of Nu-Earth not contaminated by chemical weapons, and is betrayed by every female character he encounters. A later storyline – "MilliCom Memories" – shows how the GIs progress through their training, and that rather than a name each GI has a letter suffixed by their age. Rogue is "R", Gunnar "G", Helm "H" and Bagman "B". Two other troopers "D" and "N" are referenced in the storyline. During their training each GI is given a nickname - Gunnar is so named because of his marksmanship ability. Millicom Memories showed there were other prototype GIs before the development of Rogue's class, some of which were killed during his training. In a multi-part story titled "The Marauders", Rogue encounters a group of deserters from both Nort and Southern sides, who operate as scavengers from a hidden base and attack both Nort and Southers in order to obtain food, ammunition and supplies. Unknown to Rogue, the commander of The Marauders is the Traitor General. Due to accident the General was severely burned and is now unrecognisable. The General later reveals himself to Rogue, then captures and tortures him. Rogue eventually escapes, and with the help of one of the Marauders (a Souther pilot known as 'Player'), defeats the Marauders that pursue him. The Traitor General escapes, destroying the Marauder base as he does so. In "All Hell on the Dix-I Front" a massive Nort assault forces the Southerners to retreat from a vast area of Nu-Earth, similar to the Ardennes assault of World War II. During this, other Elite units of the Nort military are introduced, such as the Sun Legion, a Regiment of solar glider troops, and the Scum Marines, an amphibious assault force. "Sister Sledge",a pun on the pop group of the same name a military nurse accompanied Rogue during the Dix-I campaign. She is secretly an enemy agent known as a "filth columnist"a play on fifth columnist and dies in the final episode of the series when Bagman causes her to fall from a boat into the heavily polluted and toxic "Scum Sea". "Fort Neuro" introduced a defensive line that has been cut off from both Southers and Norts since the beginning of the war. The Fort has been split into separate sectors by the same clouds, meaning each sector operates independently of each other, without any contact or cohesion. The soldiers within each sector are suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder so the French sector – known as "Franks" – wear Napoleonic era uniforms, and hold grand balls that were popular in that period. Other sectors display similar erratic behaviour, with the English troops – known as "Lime- ees" – dressing as holiday camp redcoats and behaving as though they are on a perpetual holiday, while the "Rom" garrison fashion themselves as 1950's Teddy Boys - or "Romeos". Rogue is immune to all known toxins, diseases, and acids with three known exceptions: * A new plant is discovered after permafrost is melted in an arctic zone, which renders him unconscious.Prog 242 * In the flashback story "Cinnabar" a retrovirus is engineered specifically to target his immune system, making him susceptible to all other Nu-Earth hazards, ultimately forcing him to wear a chem-suit. * On Horst, Rogue is bitten by one of the Dragoid creatures causing him to pass out. As Bagman points out, Rogue was engineered to be resistant to conditions on Nu Earth, not those unique to Horst. However, the toxin quickly wears off, and in fact has a beneficial effect on Rogue. In a lighter moment during the Fort Neuro series, Rogue is shown to have difficulty breathing when in a staff car full of officers from the "Rom" sector, who in anticipation of a good night out with the neighbouring "Scan" sector, have applied too much aftershave.Prog 300 The Biochips are infected by a latent malady unknowingly contracted whilst passing through the Neverglades area of Nu Earth. The unnamed condition renders them susceptible to "Enzyme E disfunction", which causes their newly re-gened bodies to disintegrate, leaving only their bio-chips. 

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The Pinafore is at its starbase being readied for further space exploration. Ralph (pronounced "Raif") Rackstraw declares his love for Josephine, the daughter of Captain Corcoran. Ralph is supported by most members of the crew with the exception of Dick Deadeye, a Klingon. Little Buttercup, a Betazoid woman who is on board to sell items to the crew, hints that she knows a secret from Ralph's past. The Captain consults his daughter Josephine and reminds her that she has the opportunity to marry Sir Joseph Porter, who is First Lord of the Starfleet Admiralty and a wealthy Ferengi. Sir Joseph arrives with his entourage of 'relatives' (Cousin Hebe and a variety of aliens) and impresses all with his exalted position. Ralph, dejected, informs his friends that he plans to end it all. In a dramatic moment, Josephine declares her love for him and they agree to leave the ship and get married. Ralph and Josephine's stealthy departure with friends from the crew is foiled when they are intercepted by Dick Deadeye and the Captain. Sir Joseph intervenes but is shocked to learn that Ralph has dared to contemplate marriage with Josephine. He orders a court-martial for the insubordinate crewman! Everyone assembles for the trial in which Sir Joseph serves as judge. After several eloquent pleas, the dilemma remains unsolved and Ralph is about to be incarcerated. It is then that Buttercup reveals her secret and provides a happy solution to the social conflict. True love unites all parties in the appropriate way! 

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In 1890 Paris crowds pour into the Moulin Rouge nightclub as artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec finishes a bottle of cognac while sketching the club's dancers. The club's regulars arrive: singer Jane Avril teases Henri charmingly, dancers La Goulue and Aicha fight, and owner Maurice Joyant offers Henri free drinks for a month in exchange for painting a promotional poster. At closing time, Henri waits for the crowds to disperse before standing to reveal his four-foot six-inch stature. As he walks to his Montmartre apartment, he recalls the events that led to his disfigurement. It is revealed that Lautrec as a boy fell down a flight of stairs, whereupon his legs failed to heal because of a genetic weakness resulting from his parents being first cousins. His legs stunted and pained, Henri loses himself in his art, while his father leaves his mother, the countess, to ensure that they have no more children. Henri is a bright, happy child, revered by his father, the Count de Toulouse-Lautrec. As a young adult, he proposes to the woman he loves but, when she tells him that no woman will ever love him, he leaves his childhood home in despair to begin a new life as a painter in Paris. Back in the present, street walker Marie Charlet begs Henri to rescue her from police sergeant Patou. Henri wards off the policeman by pretending to be her escort, after which she insists on following him home. There, she addresses his small stature and, although he is at first angry, he allows her to stay and is charmed when she claims not to care about his legs. Within days, he is buying her gifts and singing as he paints, until Marie takes his money and stays out all night. Henri waits in agony for her return, but when she finally does he tells her to leave at once. Realizing he loves her, Marie vows to stay and love him back. Though she continues to fight with him, he tells himself her crassness stems from her poverty, and lets her stay. During one fight Marie tells Henri he can never attract a real woman, and leaves. By morning, she begs him to take her back, but he refuses. He begins drinking and does not stop until his landlady calls his mother, who urges him to save his health by finding Marie. Henri searches Marie's working-class neighborhood, finally discovering her at a café, where she drunkenly reveals she stayed with him only to procure money for her boyfriend. When she adds that his touch made her sick, Henri returns to his apartment, and turns on the gas vents. As he sits waiting to die, he is suddenly inspired to finish his Moulin Rouge poster and, brush in hand, distractedly turns the vents off again. The next day, Henri brings the poster to the dance hall and, though the style is unusual, Maurice accepts it. Henri works for days at the lithographers, blending his own inks to perfect the vivid colors. When he finishes the poster, which shows a woman dancing with her legs exposed, it becomes an instant sensation and the Moulin Rouge opens to high society. His father denounces Henri for the "pornographic" work. Over the next ten years, Henri records Parisian life in brilliant paintings. By 1900 he is famous, but still terribly lonely. One day he sees Myriamme Hyam standing at the edge of Pont Alexandre III over the Seine River. Thinking she might jump, he stops to talk to her. She spurns his advances and throws a key into the water. Days later, Jane, a friend of Myriamme, arranges a meeting for them. Myriamme is a great admirer of Henri's paintings, and the two begin to spend time together. She soon reveals to Henri that the key she threw into the water belonged to a married man, Marcel de la Voisier, who asked her to be his mistress. While Henri continues to decry the possibility of true love he falls in love with Myriamme. One day the two see dancer La Goulue on the street drunkenly insisting that she was once a star. Henri realizes that the Moulin Rouge has become a respectable establishment and no longer the home for misfits. Myriamme informs Henri that Marcel has asked her to marry him. Certain she loves the more handsome man, he bitingly congratulates her for trapping Marne. Myriamme asks Henri if he loves her, but, believing that she is only trying to spare his feelings, he lies and tells her he does not. By the time he receives a letter from her stating that she loves him, but cannot wait any longer, Myriamme has left the city and Henri goes on an unsuccessful search for her. Weeks later, while sitting in a dive drinking steadily, Henri repeatedly reads Myriamme's note. Patou, now an inspector, is called to help him. Once home, in a state of delirium tremens, Henri hallucinates that he sees cockroaches, and in trying to drive them away, accidentally falls down a flight of stairs. Near death, Henri is brought to his family home. After a priest reads the last rites, his father tearfully informs Henri that he is to be the first living artist to be shown in the Louvre, and begs for forgiveness. Henri turns his head and watches as phantasmal characters from his Moulin Rouge paintings, including Jane Avril, dance into the room to bid him goodbye before his death. 

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When complications arise during her breast augmentation surgery, 20th-century exotic dancer Cleo (Jennifer Sky) is put into suspended animation. Waking 525 years in the future, Cleo joins two women in their fight against the Baileys, armed flying machines who now control Earth's surface. Her team leader, Hel (Gina Torres), is commanded by a mysterious female entity called "Voice", who relays orders via a communications implant under Hel's right ear. Voice controls many other teams and gives them their orders in a similar fashion, in effect, forming a resistance to the Baileys, with their ultimate goal to retake the Earth's surface. Their final team member is Sarge (Victoria Pratt), whose sister belongs to a cult that regards the Baileys with reverence and willingly sacrifices themselves to them. Humanity has moved underground and built a complex of elaborate shafts and tunnels created by the "shaft builders" to survive the Bailey menace. Cleo (pictured above on the right) wows the 26th century denizens with her philosophical sayings (many of which come from the 20th century popular culture). 

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Kaytee's gift for song steers an inner turmoil about her future. Morgan's sullen and needy exterior masks his true compassion. After revealing his deepest secret to his peers, what's next for Brad? Who are they? These are real teenagers who unleash their adolescent anxieties amid their triumphs in American High. At the brink of adulthood, they face some of the toughest decisions and harshest realizations of their lives during the 1999-2000 school year at a suburban Chicago high school. But these kids aren’t actors. The situations aren’t contrived. The programs are not scripted. Cameras roll and the ensuing drama is riveting and real. American High is an innovative drama series from Academy Award-nominated filmmaker R.J. Cutler ("The War Room," "The Perfect Candidate"). Following the lives of a group of students as they deal with their personal conflicts – both at home and at school – from the first day of senior year through graduation, the series is culled from 10 months of documentary footage shot by Cutler and his production team, which includes some of America's leading documentary filmmakers. Also featured in the series are scenes from hundreds of hours of "video diaries" shot by the students themselves. This remarkable combination of professional footage and student-shot video provides a window into what it's like to be a teenager growing up in America today. Brimming with exuberance, hipness and stylish editing, American High boasts authenticity as well as addictive drama. "They trusted our crews to tell their stories truthfully and honestly," says producer Cutler of the students. "I wanted this to be as honest as any of the best cinéma vérité documentaries." And Cutler has succeeded, with scenes that are often brutally frank. The footage from the students’ own video diaries is among the most fascinating. These scenes capture an eclectic mix of characters baring their souls as they confront conflicts with powerful emotions. Precocious Kaytee, the gifted singer/songwriter whose music fills the hallways at school and creates decision-making dilemmas for her. Easygoing and athletic Robby, whose best friend is Brad – the first high-profile kid to announce his homosexuality, confronts the future of his shaky relationship with Sarah. Anna, whose intimidating beauty affords her everything except what she really wants – a boyfriend. Mike ("Kiwi"), the star football kicker whose future hinges on a successful season. One of the series’ most dynamic characters, rebellious Morgan, comes across as angry and needy, masking a compassionate and sensitive nature. Half a dozen other students reveal complex natures and share their innermost feelings. 

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Stephen Glass is a reporter at The New Republic, where he has made a name for himself for writing colorful stories. His editor Michael Kelly is revered by the magazine's young staff. When David Keene (at the time Chairman of the American Conservative Union) questions Glass's description of minibars and the drunken antics of Young Republicans at a convention, Kelly backs his reporter when Glass admits to one mistake but says the rest is true. Kelly is fired after he stands up to his boss Marty Peretz on an unrelated personnel issue, and fellow writer Charles "Chuck" Lane is promoted as a replacement. The magazine publishes an entertaining story by Glass titled "Hack Heaven" about Ian Restil, a teenage hacker who was given a lucrative job at software company Jukt Micronics after hacking into its computer system. After the article is published, Forbes Digital Tool reporter Adam Penenberg begins researching the story in order to discover how Glass scooped everyone else; Penenberg is unable to uncover any corroborating evidence for Glass's story. Questioned by the Forbes reporter, Lane becomes suspicious when Glass cannot provide sources for his article and when the few pieces of concrete evidence are discovered to be an amateurish website representing Jukt Micronics and a Palo Alto phone number with only one phone line where every call goes directly to voicemail. Penenberg and his colleague Andy Fox can find no proof Jukt or any of the people mentioned in the story exist: Restil, Jukt president George Sims, former NBA agent Joe Hiert, and Nevada law enforcement official Jim Ghort. Lane drives Glass to the convention center where the hacker convention supposedly took place. When Lane asks a security guard for help, he learns the convention center was not open that day. Lane also discovers that the restaurant where the hackers supposedly ate dinner afterwards closes in the early afternoon. After haphazardly trying to defend himself, Glass finally "admits" to Lane that he wasn't actually at the hacker convention, but relied on sources for information and pretended he was there to give the article a first-person feel. Lane is outraged, but proceeds cautiously while seeking the truth. He suspends Glass, earning him the enmity of staff reporters who all are fond of Glass. Caitlin Avey is so angered by Lane's actions that she considers quitting. When a fellow staff member calls Lane, expressing concern for Glass's state of mind, he mentions that Glass has a brother living in Palo Alto. Lane realizes the brother must have posed as Sims on the day he returned Lane's phone call. Glass pleads for another chance, but Lane orders him out of the office and takes his security access card. Searching through back issues of The New Republic, Lane realizes that much of Glass's previous work was falsified. When an emotional Glass returns, Lane fires him. Caitlin accuses Lane of wanting to get rid of everyone who was loyal to Kelly, but he challenges her to act like the good reporter she is. He reminds her that half of the falsified stories were published on Kelly's watch after being fact- checked, and that the entire staff will have to apologize to their readers for allowing Glass to continue to hand in fictitious stories. The following day, a receptionist wryly remarks to Lane that all this trouble could have been averted if the stories required photographs, which Lane had argued against putting in the magazine. Lane discovers the staff has written an apology to their readers. They spontaneously applaud their editor, signifying their unity. At a meeting with Lane and a lawyer, Glass tacitly admits that 27 of the 41 articles he wrote for The New Republic were fabricated in whole or in part. An epilogue reveals that Glass decided to complete law school and wrote a novel called The Fabulist about a reporter who fabricates his stories, and that Kelly was killed in Iraq while covering Operation Iraqi Freedom. The film is dedicated to his memory. 

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The novel is a framed narrative. The framing story concerns an unnamed male narrator spending a winter in Starkfield while in the area on business. He spots a limping, quiet man around the village, who is somehow compelling in his demeanor and carriage. This is Ethan Frome, who is a lifelong resident and a local fixture of the community. Frome is described by the narrator as "the most striking figure in Starkfield", "the ruin of a man" with a "careless powerful look ... in spite of a lameness checking each step like the jerk of a chain". Curious, the narrator sets out to learn about him. He learns that Frome's limp arose from having been injured in a "smash-up" twenty-four years before, but further details are not forthcoming, and the narrator fails to learn much more from Frome's fellow townspeople other than that Ethan's attempt at higher education decades before was thwarted by the sudden illness of his father following an injury, forcing his return to the farm to assist his parents, never to leave again. Because people seem not to wish to speak other than in vague and general terms about Frome's past, the narrator's curiosity grows, but he learns little more. Chance circumstances arise that allow the narrator to hire Frome as his driver for a week. A severe snowstorm during one of their journeys forces Frome to allow the narrator to shelter at his home one night. Just as the two are entering Frome's house, the prologue ends and the framed story begins. The narration switches from the first-person narrator of the prologue to a limited third-person narrator. We then embark on the "first" chapter (Chapter I), which takes place twenty-four years prior. In Chapter I, Ethan is waiting outside a church dance for Mattie, his wife's cousin, who has for a year lived with Ethan and his sickly wife, Zeena (Zenobia), in order to help out around the house and farm. Mattie is given the occasional night off to entertain herself in town as partial recompense for helping care for the Fromes, and Ethan has the duty of walking her home. It is quickly clear that Ethan has deep feelings for Mattie. Passing the graveyard, he thinks in an intense moment of foreshadowing that, "We'll always go on living here together, and some day she'll lie there beside me." It also becomes clear that Zeena has observed enough to understand that he has these feelings and, understandably, she resents them. When Zeena leaves for an overnight visit to seek treatment for her various complaints and symptoms in a neighboring town, Ethan is excited to have an evening alone with Mattie. During this evening, the narrator reveals small actions that show that they each have feelings for the other, including a lingering of touching hands on the milk jug, although neither openly declares their love. Mattie makes supper and retrieves from a high shelf Zeena's treasured pickle dish, which Zeena, in a symbol of her stingy nature, never uses, in order to protect it. Mattie uses it to present Ethan with a simple supper, and disaster ensues when the Fromes' cat jumps on the table and knocks it off, shattering it beyond repair. Ethan tries to help by setting the dish's pieces neatly in the cupboard, presenting the false impression of wholeness if not examined closely, with plans to purchase some glue and fix it as soon as he can. In the morning Ethan's hopes for more private time with Mattie are foiled by the presence of his hired man. Ethan then goes into town to buy glue for the broken pickle dish, and upon his return finds that Zeena has also come home. Zeena retreats upstairs, proclaiming her illness, and refusing supper because she is not hungry. There, she informs Ethan that she plans to send Mattie away and has already hired another girl to replace her, claiming that she needs someone more efficient because her health is failing more rapidly than ever. Ethan is angry and frustrated to the point of panic by the thought of losing Mattie, and he is also worried for Mattie, who has no other place to go and no way to support herself in the world. He returns to the kitchen and joins Mattie, and tries to eat, but he is distraught and suddenly blurts out Zeena's plans to send Mattie away. Mattie reacts with shock but rapid acceptance, trying to calm Ethan, while Ethan becomes more agitated and begins to insist that he will not let her go. Ethan kisses her. Moments later, they are interrupted by Zeena, who has decided that she is hungry after all. After supper, Zeena discovers the broken pickle dish and is heartbroken and enraged; this betrayal cements her determination to send Mattie away. Ethan, miserable at the thought of losing Mattie and worried sick about her fate, considers running away with Mattie, but he lacks the money to do so. He feels that he cannot abandon Zeena because he knows that she would neither be able to run the farm nor sell it (the poor quality of the place has been discussed at several points in the story already). Every plan he thinks of is impossible to carry out, and he remains in despair and frantically trying to think of a way to change this one more turn of events against his ability to have a happy life. The next morning, Zeena describes her specific and imminent plans for sending Mattie on her way. Panicked, Ethan rushes into town to try to get a cash advance from a customer for a load of lumber in order to have the money with which to abscond with Mattie. His plan is unhinged by guilt, however, when his customer's wife expresses compassion, understanding, and empathy for Ethan's lot, which has involved the repeated duty to care for others, first his parents, then his sickly wife. He realizes that, of all people, he cannot cheat this kindly woman and her husband out of money, since she is one of the few people who have ever seemed to have seen or openly acknowledged Ethan's lifelong plight, as well as his honor in fulfilling his duties. Ethan returns to the farm and picks up Mattie to take her to the train station. They stop at a hill upon which they had once planned to go sledding and decide to sled together as a way of delaying their sad parting, after which they anticipate never seeing each other again. After their first run, Mattie suggests a suicide pact: that they go down again, and steer the sled directly into a tree, so they will never be parted and so that they may spend their last moments together. Ethan first refuses to go through with the plan, but in his despair that mirrors Mattie's, he ultimately agrees, and they get on the sled, clutching each other. On the way down, a vision of Zeena's face startles Ethan into swerving a bit, but he corrects their course, and they crash headlong and at high speed into the elm tree. Ethan regains consciousness after the accident but Mattie lies beside him, "cheeping" in pain like a small wounded animal. Ethan is also injured, and the reader is left to understand that this was the "smash-up" that left Ethan with a permanent limp. The epilogue returns to the framing story and the first-person narrator point of view of the prologue. The framing story resumes precisely where it left off: just as Frome and his visitor, the narrator, enter the Frome household in the story's present. The narrator hears a complaining female voice, and it is easy to assume that it belongs to the never-happy Zeena, but in the final twist of the story, it emerges that it is in fact Mattie, who now lives with the Fromes due to having been paralyzed in the accident. Her misery over her plight and dependence has embittered and "soured" her, and, with roles reversed, Zeena is now forced to care for her as well as Ethan. Further illustrating the psychosomatic nature of most of Zeena's previous complaints, she has now found the strength through necessity to be the caregiver rather than being the invalid. In an agonizing irony, Ethan and Mattie have gotten their wish to stay together, but in mutual unhappiness and discontent, with Mattie helpless and paralyzed, and with Zeena as a constant presence between the two of them. 

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It is set at the turn of the 19th century on the fictional French-controlled island of Pulau-PulauSeason 1, Episode 13, 01:59 in the East Indies. Jack Stiles is an American secret agent sent there by President Jefferson. While there, he meets his British contact and love interest, English spy Emilia Rothschild. Together, the two work to stop Napoleon and various other threats to the United States. To the public, Jack is seen as Emilia's attaché (she sometimes serves as his), and in order to protect his identity as a secret agent, while acting against the enemies of America, Jack often adopts the identity of a legendary (though otherwise fictional) masked hero: "the Daring Dragoon". The show contained many ongoing gags, such as historical inaccuracies (such as Canada being a French territory rather than part of the British Empire), Jack being responsible for many important historical events but not receiving credit, Emilia inventing a miraculous invention in an obvious deus ex machina, sexual puns and innuendos, and Jack and Emilia's ongoing romantic tension. 

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Housewife and former cellist Claire Spencer and her husband Norman, an accomplished scientist and professor, live a quiet life in Vermont. Her relationship seems slightly strained, and their daughter Caitlin leaving for college heightens this. Claire begins noticing the volatile relationship between new neighbors, Mary and Warren Feur. Norman dismisses her preoccupation. After failing to see Mary for several days, Claire suspects that Warren may have killed her. Claire sees the image of a woman floating in the lake, and discovers an odd key inside a heater vent in her home. Claire and her mystic friend Jody unsuccessfully hold a séance to contact Mary, after which Claire finds the bathtub filled with hot water and, "You know," written on the mirror. Claire then finds her computer inexplicably typing "MEF" repeatedly. Claire becomes convinced Mary is haunting her, but Norman is unconvinced. Several days later, Mary returns home alive and well, saying that she was with her mother in Rhode Island after a fight with Warren. After accidentally breaking a picture frame from Norman's desk, she finds inside a newspaper clipping of a missing woman named Madison Elizabeth Frank, who bears a striking resemblance to her, and whose initials match "MEF." Claire tracks down Madison's mother, and asks if she could see Madison's room. While in the room, Claire steals a lock of Madison's hair, and notices a photo of Madison, wearing an unusual necklace. Later that night, Claire reads about conjuring the dead, performs a ritual, and becomes possessed. When Norman arrives home from work, Claire (possessed by Madison, as she was holding the lock of her hair) aggressively seduces him. Claire's face briefly changes to that of Madison, shocking Norman, who throws Claire off him. Claire, dropping the hair and becoming herself again, recalls a repressed memory of discovering Norman's affair with Madison, his student. Norman admits to the affair, saying it was during a time their marriage was having trouble. Claire spends the night with Jody, who reveals to her that she had witnessed Norman arguing with a blonde woman at a cafe in the nearby town of Adamant about a year earlier. Claire returns home and finds Norman in the tub after an apparent suicide attempt, but he recovers. Claire asks Norman if he killed Madison, which he denies. He then witnesses Claire being drawn to the lake. Claire, again holding the lock of Madison's hair, is pulled under the water by an unseen force. It pulls her down to the bottom, where she sees a box with the same symbol as Madison's necklace. Before she can grab it, Norman pulls her up from the lake, and the two burn the hair. Claire later visits Adamant. She spots a shop with ornate lockboxes with the same design as the one in the lake. When Claire returns home, she recovers the box from the lake, and unlocks it with the matching key she'd previously found. Inside, she finds Madison's necklace. Norman finds her with the box and changes his story, claiming that Madison killed herself in their home, and that he pushed her car into the lake with her inside. Norman agrees to confess to authorities, calling 911 to explain the situation. When Norman leaves the room, Claire redials the phone to discover that he actually dialed 411, and had faked the conversation. Norman attacks her, paralyzing her with halothane, and finally admits to murdering Madison to prevent her from exposing their affair to the dean of the university. He had also faked his suicide attempt. Norman places Claire in the bathtub, filling it with water and staging a suicide for her. He spots Madison's necklace around Claire's neck; as he moves her, her face contorts to that of Madison's corpse. Frightened, Norman jerks away, and smashes his head on the bathroom sink, rendering him unconscious. Recovering from the paralysis, Claire manages to shut the tap off with her toe in time to save herself from drowning. She finds that Norman has left the bathroom and discovers him seemingly unconscious downstairs. She flees in the couple's truck, which has their boat hitched to the back. As she is crossing the bridge over Lake Champlain, Norman, who was hiding in the back of the truck bed, attacks Claire, who frantically dials 911 on her cell phone and causes the truck to careen down the embankment into the lake. The ship's mast comes loose, and as it sinks to the bottom, it dislodges Madison's car. Disturbed by the debris, Madison's corpse floats toward the couple as Norman tries to drown Claire. Madison grabs Norman's arm, shocking him, which allows Claire to escape and swim to the surface. Norman drowns, and Madison's corpse drifts away. Later in the winter, Claire places a red rose on Madison's grave. 

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Astrid Magnussen is a 12-year-old girl living in Los Angeles, California with her mother, Ingrid Magnussen, a self-centered and eccentric poet. Astrid's father, Klaus Anders, left before Astrid was old enough to remember him. Ingrid begins dating a man named Barry. Eventually, Ingrid discovers that Barry is cheating on her with younger women, so she breaks into Barry's house and poisons him with a mixture of DMSO and oleander sap. Barry dies, and Ingrid is charged with his murder. Sentenced to life in prison, she promises her daughter that she will come back. Astrid is shuffled from one foster home to another for years. First, she joins Starr, a former stripper, and recovering drug addict and alcoholic. Starr has two children of her own, as well as two other foster children. Astrid (who is 14 by this time) has a sexual relationship with Starr's live-in boyfriend, Ray. As his interest in Starr diminishes, Starr relapses. One night, after confronting Ray over his relationship with Astrid (out of jealousy and not concern), Starr shoots Astrid with a .38. Astrid is hospitalized for a few weeks, at which time she begins abusing the prescription drug Demerol. After recovery Astrid is sent to live with Ed and Marvel Turlock, and their two small children, essentially as an unpaid babysitter. Astrid dislikes the couple, partially due to her dislike of the house, and partially due to Marvel's tendency to make racist statements about minorities, particularly their next-door neighbor, a beautiful African- American prostitute named Olivia Johnstone, whom Astrid befriends. Astrid admires Olivia's beauty, wealth, and hedonistic lifestyle. The Turlocks send Astrid away when they discover she associates with Olivia. Next, Astrid is sent to the home of a Hispanic woman named Amelia Ramos. Despite her wealth, Amelia starves her foster children, and Astrid resorts to eating from the garbage at school. Astrid eventually gets a new caseworker who finds her a new placement. A former actress, Claire Richards, and her husband, Ron, are Astrid's next foster parents. Claire ensures Astrid's comfort. For once, Astrid is doing well in school and pursuing art. Astrid continues corresponding with Ingrid in prison but becomes increasingly bitter towards her mother. Meanwhile, Claire suspects that Ron is having an affair. Claire, emotionally disturbed, commits suicide by overdosing. Astrid, now 17, is placed in MacLaren Children's Center (known as "Mac") where she meets an artistic boy named Paul Trout. They bond, but Astrid is sent to a new home. Astrid's final home is with Russian immigrant Rena Grushenka. Astrid, still underage, has a sexual relationship with Rena's boyfriend, Sergei. One day, after getting high on acid, Astrid begins to have memories of a woman named Annie. Meanwhile, Ingrid and her lawyer begin to build a case to get Ingrid released from prison. However, their case depends on Astrid: if she testifies that Ingrid did not murder Barry, Ingrid will likely not be sentenced. Astrid realizes that she is in a position of power over her mother and asks Ingrid who Annie is. Ingrid reveals that Annie was a babysitter with whom Ingrid left Astrid for over a year. Astrid is upset and gives Ingrid a choice: to have her testify or to see her daughter return to the person her mother knew her as. Ingrid makes the choice not to ask Astrid to lie for her. Two years later, Astrid is 20 and living with Paul in a rundown flat in Berlin, Germany. Astrid spends her time buying suitcases and transforming them into individual art pieces representing her different foster homes. Ingrid is released from prison after a new trial acquits her. Astrid realizes that if she returns to California to reunite with Ingrid, she must abandon Paul. She chooses to stay with him but longs to go. 

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Seventh-day Adventist Church pastor Michael Chamberlain, his wife Lindy Chamberlain, their two sons, and their nine-week-old daughter Azaria are on a camping holiday in the Australian Outback. With the baby sleeping in their tent, the family enjoys a barbecue with their fellow campers when a cry is heard. Lindy returns to the tent to check and is certain she sees a dingo with something in its mouth running off as she approaches. When she discovers the infant is missing, everyone joins forces to search for her, without success. It is assumed what Lindy saw was the animal carrying off the child, and a subsequent inquest rules her account of events is true. The tide of public opinion soon turns against the Chamberlains. For many, Lindy seems too stoic, too cold-hearted, and too accepting of the disaster that has befallen her. Gossip about her begins to swell and soon is accepted as statements of fact. The couple's beliefs are not widely practised in the country, and when the media report a rumour that the name Azaria means "sacrifice in the wilderness", the public is quick to believe they decapitated their baby with a pair of scissors as part of a bizarre religious rite. Law-enforcement officials find new witnesses, forensics experts, and circumstantial evidence and reopen the investigation, eventually charging Lindy with murder. Seven months pregnant, she ignores her attorneys' advice to play on the jury's sympathy and appears stoic on the stand, convincing some onlookers of her guilt. As the trial progresses, Michael's faith in his religion and his belief in his wife falter, and he stumbles through his testimony, suggesting he is concealing the truth. In October 1982, Lindy is found guilty and immediately sentenced to life imprisonment with hard labour, while Michael is found guilty as an accessory and given an 18-month suspended sentence. More than three years later, while searching for the body of an English tourist who fell from Uluru, police discover clothing that is identified as the jacket Lindy had insisted Azaria was wearing over her jumpsuit, which had been recovered early in the investigation. She is immediately released from prison, the case is reopened and all convictions against the Chamberlains overturned. The film ends with Michael commenting on the ongoing battle to clear the family’s name. 

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Owen Baker (Liam Aiken) is a 12-year-old who has been working as the neighborhood dog-walker so he can earn the privilege of getting a dog of his own. Owen's hard work pays off when his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Baker (Kevin Nealon and Molly Shannon), let Owen adopt a scruffy Border Terrier that he names Hubble (voice of Matthew Broderick). Owen has little time to make lasting friends, due to his parents' renovation and reselling of houses, so he hopes Hubble will be his best friend. Owen does have a friend named Connie Flemming (Brittany Moldowan), a girl his age who lives in the neighborhood, but he is also bullied by two boys named Frankie (Hunter Elliott) and Fred (Mikhael Speidel). Soon after the adoption of Hubble, Owen finds out that his new abnormally intelligent dog actually came from outer space. Owen wakes up the next morning to discover that he can now understand every word Hubble says—including the ominous phrase: "Take me to your leaders." Owen learns that dogs came to Earth thousands of years ago to colonize and dominate the planet. Hubble, who is really named Canid 3942, has been sent by the powerful Greater Dane (voice of Vanessa Redgrave) on a mission from the Dog Star Sirius 7 to make sure dogs have fulfilled this destiny. The dogs Owen walks include pampered Poodle Barbara Ann (voiced by Delta Burke), rambunctious Boxer Wilson (voiced by Donald Faison), nervous Italian Greyhound Nelly (voiced by Brittany Murphy) and Connie's gassy Bernese Mountain Dog Shep (voiced by Carl Reiner). Despite the best efforts of Owen and this rag-tag group of neighborhood dogs to convince Hubble that everything is fine with Earth's dogs, Hubble soon discovers the awful truth about Earth dogs: "You're all pets!" Things get worse when Hubble learns that the Greater Dane is headed for Earth to do her own inspection. If things don't look right, all dogs on Earth will be recalled to Sirius. Owen and Hubble have to work together to prepare the neighborhood dogs for a visit from the Greater Dane and her Chinese Crested Dog henchman (voiced by Cheech Marin). Owen, Hubble, Connie, and their canine pals set out to whip the other dogs into shape so that they can pass muster. Owen's efforts fail and the Greater Dane recalls all dogs from Earth. Upset, Owen repairs Hubble's communicator and sends him a message declaring how much he loves him. The Greater Dane hears the message and is left curious by it so she approaches Hubble for his opinion on why the dogs on Earth are subservient to humanity when they should be ruling it. Hubble believes that the dogs and humans have formed a bond of love and loyalty. When asked where his own loyalty lies, Hubble asks the Greater Dane to refer to him as Hubble rather than Canid 3942, showing his bond with Owen. As a result, the Greater Dane sends the Earth dogs back and declares them a separate species. Hubble is allowed to return as well, but on the condition that he removes Owen's ability to communicate with dogs. Owen's parents choose to remain in town for once and Hubble starts to fit in as an Earth dog. 

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The Whales of August tells the story of two elderly widowed sisters from Philadelphia, near the end of their lives, spending their annual summer in a seaside house in Maine. The surroundings cause them to recall their relationship as young women, and the summers they had enjoyed there in the past. They reflect on the passage of time, and the bitterness, jealousies and misunderstandings that slowly festered over the years and kept them from establishing a true closeness in their relationship. Libby, played by Davis, is the more infirm of the two sisters, and her nature has become bitter and cold as a result. Sarah, played by Gish, is a softer and more tolerant character, intent on nursing her sister through her discomfort and trying to breach the gulf that has grown between them. The resentment that Libby so clearly displays to her stifles Sarah's every attempt at making a friendly overture towards her, and Sarah cautiously retreats from her. Maranov (Price) is an expatriate from Russia who has recently lost the friend that he has been living with. Tisha (Sothern) is a vivacious lifelong friend who provides common sense, fun and laughter, and is the catalyst for some of the sisters' conversations and revelations. In prologue, actresses Margaret Ladd, Mary Steenburgen and Tisha Sterling (Sothern's real-life daughter) play respectively Libby, Sarah, and Tisha as young women. 

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Events of the serial are framed on an arcing plot that carries through the other three serials of the 23rd season. In this, the Sixth Doctor is forced to land the TARDIS aboard a Gallifreyan space station, where he is brought into a courtroom. The Inquisitor informs the Doctor he is on trial for conduct unbecoming a Time Lord; evidence will be presented by the Valeyard. The first evidence is shown through video footage, taken from the Matrix, of the Doctor's recent involvement in the planet Ravolox, where the Valeyard shows that the Doctor willingly became involved in the affairs of the planet. The Doctor denies these charges as the Valeyard brings them. After showing the video, the Valeyard affirms he has more evidence sufficient to call for the end of the Doctor's life. As shown by the court evidence, the Doctor and Peri land on Ravolox, both noting a similarity to Earth. The Doctor is aware that Ravolox was devastated by a fireball, according to official records, but the presence of flourishing plant life make him suspicious. As they walk, they are observed by Sabalom Glitz and Dibber, mercenaries on the planet attempting to destroy a "black light" generator in order to destroy the L3 robot deep underground that it powers. The Doctor and Peri find a tunnel and enter to find remains that appear to be that of the Marble Arch tube station on the London Underground Central line, piquing the Doctor's curiosity further. The Doctor wishes to proceed deeper, but Peri is worried and stays behind. Peri is soon captured by a local human tribe, led by Katryca, and brought to their camp. Katryca informs Peri that she will need to take many husbands for the tribe, and locks her away with Glitz and Dibber; the two were captured after approaching the tribe to try to convince them to let them destroy the generator, which the tribe has taken as a totem. The three manage to overpower the guards and escape, but not before planting a bomb on the black light generator. They are pursued by the tribe. The Doctor, in exploring the modern underground complex, is also captured by humans under watch by "the Immortal". He is brought before the Immortal, the L3 robot that Glitz is looking for. The robot calls itself Drathro, and is following its instructions to maintain the habitat of the underground system. Drathro orders the Doctor to make necessary repairs, but the Doctor manages to temporarily electrify the robot and make his escape. Drathro sends a service robot after the Doctor. Peri, Glitz, and Dibber eventually meet up with the Doctor back at the ruins of Marble Arch, trapped between the tribe and the service robot. However, the tribesmen disable the service robot and recapture the group including the Doctor. The Doctor tries to explain the nature of the tribe's totem, but Katryca is unimpressed and places them in a cell again. While there, Glitz confirms that Ravolox is actually Earth. Drathro reactivates the service robot and sends it into the tribe's village to recapture the Doctor, but the tribe is able to disable it again; Katryca decides they should attack Drathro's "castle" to steal its technology for itself. The Doctor and Peri use the opportunity to escape and re-enter the underground complex, aware that the black light generator is now severely damaged beyond repair, and if it should self-destruct, it could take the whole universe with it. Katryca and the tribe are easily defeated by Drathro. When the Doctor arrives, he attempts to plead for Drathro to shut himself down in order to disable the black light system, but Drathro refuses. Glitz, Dibber and Peri arrive after being detained by Drathro, and Glitz offers to take the robot aboard his ship, which has a functioning black light system. Drathro agrees, and departs with the mercenaries. The Doctor finds the black light system is already beginning to self-destruct, and reconfigures the system so that its explosion would be limited to the underground complex. The Doctor, Peri, and the other humans living underground escape in time. The remains of the tribe offer to take in those humans that were living underground, and the Doctor and Peri say their goodbyes. 

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As with the other serials from Season 23, Mindwarp is framed by the trial of the Sixth Doctor, prosecuted by the Valeyard, accusing him of meddling in other species' affairs in a way unbecoming of a Time Lord. The Valeyard provides evidence to the presiding Inquisitor via a screen linked to the Matrix showing the details of the Doctor's actions on the planet Thoros Beta. The bulk of the episode centres on recorded narrative. As shown by the video, the Doctor and Peri arrive on Thoros Beta, the Doctor's curiosity piqued on the availability of advanced weaponry by the Warlords of Thordon. As they explore a cave system, the Doctor discovers Sil, an arms dealer for the Mentors that are supplying the weapons. Exploring further, they find that the scientist Crozier in Sil's employ is attempting to perfect the ability to transplant the brilliant mind of Kiv, Sil's superior, into another body to overcome Kiv's pending death. When discovered, the two make their escape with the warlord King Yrcanos, one of Crozier's test subjects. The Doctor, Peri, Yrcanos and his men plan an attack on Sil, but the Doctor betrays by abandoning them at the last minute and warns the Mentors, causing Peri and Yrcanos to flee in different directions. Peri happens across one of the Mentors' servant woman, and with her help, disguises herself to get close to the Doctor. The Doctor reveals Peri to the Mentors and requests he be allowed to interrogate her alone, a request Sil allows. Away from the others, the Doctor tells Peri his betrayal was all a ploy to learn more of Sil's plan, and has discovered that they will transplant Kiv's mind into his body if he does not cooperate. Crozier interrupts the interrogation, believing he can extract more information from Peri, but then Yrcanos arrives, ready to kill the Doctor. Peri stops Yrcanos, and together they escape, regrouping with Yrcanos' men. As Kiv's body is dying, Crozier is forced to transplant his brain with the Doctor's help into the body of one of the Mentors' servants, keeping the mind alive but affected by the simple thoughts of the former consciousness. Yrcanos, Peri, and his men launch another attack, this time on a weapons stash, but are stunned and captured. Sil and Crozier decide to use Peri as a more suitable body for Kiv's brain, despite the Doctor's objections. As the operation is being prepared, the Doctor sneaks away and frees Yrcanos, urging him on for Peri's safety. Peri is strapped down and gagged as the operation is prepared and Crozier gives the order for her head to be shaven. The Doctor attempts to return to save her but is suddenly drawn hypnotically into the TARDIS, which appears in the hallway; it is later revealed that he travelled directly to his trial from that point. Despite the Doctor claiming that the Time Lords' interference has put Peri's life in danger, the Valeyard rebuffs this, stating that the Doctor shouldn't have become involved in the first place, and Peri's life is the cost of his involvement. Events on Thoros Beta continue after the Doctor's removal, as it is shown that Ycranos was placed in a time bubble by the Time Lords to hold his arrival back at the lab until after Kiv's mind was successfully transplanted into Peri; when Yrcanos is freed of the bubble, he is distraught at the results of the operation, and fires wildly, killing Peri. The Valeyard insists that the interference of the Time Lords was to prevent a greater disaster befalling the universe due to the mistakes in the Doctor's actions. The Doctor insists that the present trial appears to be serving a greater cause, and resolves to determine what it is as the trial continues. 

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As with the other serials from Season 23, Terror of the Vervoids is framed by the trial of the Sixth Doctor, prosecuted by the Valeyard, accusing him of meddling in other species' affairs in a way unbecoming of a Time Lord. In his defence, the Doctor presents evidence through a screen linked to the Matrix, showing the details of his actions on the spaceliner Hyperion III in his own personal future. The bulk of the episode centres on recorded narrative. On the Hyperion III, an elderly man named Kimber thinks he recognises a fellow passenger as an investigator called Hallett. However, the passenger claims that he is a mineralogist called Grenville. A trio of scientist passengers - Professor Lasky and her colleagues Bruchner and Doland - are alarmed that Grenville might be an investigator. Edwardes, the communications officer, detects a craft close to the ship - the TARDIS - but is unable to get a reply. Suddenly, an unseen figure attacks him and injects him with a syringe, causing him to fall and die. He then uses the communication equipment to send a message to the TARDIS. On board, the Doctor and his new companion, Mel Bush, pick up a Mayday message. They materialise within the Hyperion III's cargo hold, are seized by guards, and are brought before Commodore Travers - whom the Doctor has met before. Travers denies sending a mayday signal, but wants the Doctor and Mel to remain on board. Travers hopes that the Doctor will find out who sent the fake mayday call. The Doctor is convinced that whoever sent the message wants him on board. Security officer Rudge takes Mel to the ship's gymnasium, where he shows her how to use the headphones and tape recordings to help her exercise. Doland informs Lasky that someone has broken into their Hydroponics centre. As they rush off to find Bruchner, Mel hears someone on her headphones, telling her to take the Doctor to Cabin 6. In the cargo hold, Lasky, Doland and Bruchner check the Hydroponics centre; the large pods inside are stable, but the Demeter seeds have been stolen from the small work cabin. At Cabin 6, the Doctor and Mel find the room has been wrecked and discover the silver Demeter seeds and a single boot. Rudge contacts Travers to inform him there has been an 'accident' in the waste disposal unit; someone has been thrown inside. All that is left is a boot matching the one found by the Doctor and Mel in Cabin 6. They learn that these belonged to Grenville, but the Doctor does not recognise the name. Mel departs to investigate the hydroponics centre alone. Mel enters the cargo hold, where she meets Edwardes. He agrees to show her the Hydroponics centre. It was set up for the journey specially for Lasky, Doland and Bruchner, and that only 'low spectrum' light is allowed inside to keep the pods dormant. When Edwardes tries to enter, he is electrocuted, creating bright sparks that activates the pods. Two guards arrive, and Mel tells them that Edwardes is dead. Later, Doland and Bruchner arrive to find that all the pods have been opened. Rudge brings the Doctor to the bridge to question Mel about being in the Hydroponics centre. Rudge then gets a message from the medical team that was sent down to the hold to collect Edwardes' body, claiming that neither Edwardes or the guard can be found. Travers decides to speed up their journey to Earth and has the ship's course altered. Three Mogarians express their concerns that this will take them close to the black hole of Tartarus, but Travers assures them that they will be within adequate safety margins. Later, one of the Mogarians collapses. The Doctor attempts to remove the figure's face plate, but the others protest that oxygen is lethal to a Mogarian. The Doctor believes it is not a Mogarian, and removes the face plate to reveal that it is Grenville. The Doctor, however, recognises the man as Hallett, an undercover investigator. When Kimber recalls recognising Hallett before, the Doctor guesses that Hallett has faked his death to avoid being discovered. Mel realises that the Demeter seeds left in the wrecked cabin were a clue to lead them to the Hydroponics centre. They look at the place, and the Doctor wonders what came out of the pods. Returning to the passenger quarters, they see Lasky leaving a guarded Isolation Room. The Doctor and Mel enter the room, where they find a half-human, half-plant hybrid strapped to a table. The creature implores them to stop Lasky, but Lasky, Bruchner and Doland sedate her. Doland tells the time travellers that the creature is his assistant, Ruth Baxter. During their experiments involving cross-fertilisation, pollen penetrated a scratch in Ruth's thumb, causing the resulting plant maturing process to partially transform her human body. They are taking her to Earth in the hope that they can reverse the infection. Mel hears a noise in the air conditioning ducts and overhears creatures planning to kill all the 'animal-kind' on the ship. As she listens, she is attacked and rendered unconscious. The murderer dumps her in a disposal trolley. The Doctor enters the gym and hears the recording, including her scream when she was attacked. The Doctor runs after the trolley and rescues her. Vervoids, on display at a Doctor Who exhibition. Bruchner is becoming increasingly hysterical about the situation with the Hydroponics centre, especially when Kimber disappears. It turns out that he, Edwardes and the missing guard have been killed by plant-like creatures called Vervoids - the creatures that came out of the pods when Edwardes was electrocuted. Lasky finds Bruchner burning the notes on their work in the Hydroponics centre's small work cabin, and tries unsuccessfully to reason with him. Bruchner knocks Lasky out, runs off and attacks a guard, taking his gun. He goes to the bridge, and forces Travers and the pilot to leave, then changes the course of the Hyperion to head into the black hole of Tartarus - planning to destroy the ship, and therefore kill the Vervoids. The Doctor, Lasky and Travers attempt to break into the bridge, but it is filled with marsh gas. This has been released into the bridge by the Vervoids, who learned that they are the only members of their species. Bruchner is killed by the gas, but the ship is still heading into the black hole. Rudge summons the two Mogarians, as they can breathe in the poisonous atmosphere. They direct the ship away from the black hole, but when it is safe, Rudge tells Travers that he and the Mogarians are taking over the ship. Mel warns Doland and Janet of the hijacking. Rudge tells the Doctor that the Mogarians are trying to regain the supply of metals stored in the vault. Rudge is taking the hijacking as a means of securing a "more comfortable retirement", as this Mogar-Earth journey was to be his last voyage as a security officer before being written off. On the bridge, an unknown assailant kills the Mogarians. Mel sneaks through the air ducts to let the Doctor know that the guards will attack the lounge. The Doctor believes this is too risky, and tells her to attack the bridge instead. When they arrive, they find the Mogarians dead, and take the face plates to prove to Rudge the hijack is over. Doland knocks the gun from Rudge's hands, and he runs into the corridors, but is killed by the Vervoids. The Doctor tells Travers about the stolen tape recording and requests permission to search the passenger cabins. While Mel checks Lasky's locker in the gym, the Doctor tells Doland that he thinks the traitor is either him or Lasky. After searching the professor's cabin, Doland suggests the cabinet in the Hydroponics centre work cabin. There, Doland reveals the tape is in his pocket, but that he has wiped it. Taking the Doctor's gun, Doland admits to the murders. Doland believes the Vervoids can be used as slave labor when brought to Earth. The Doctor has disarmed the gun, and Travers arrives and arrests Doland. However, he and his guard are attacked and killed by the Vervoids. The Doctor, Mel, Travers and Lasky meet to discuss the Vervoids. Lasky believes that something must have gone wrong with their DNA, but the Doctor tells them that the Vervoids' hostility towards them is instinctive: The Vervoids hate 'animal-kind' and kill for survival. Lasky realises that this is what made Bruchner so hysterical, and vows to help destroy the creatures. In the hydroponics centre, Lasky finds that the chemicals to create herbicide had been taken by the Vervoids. She, Mel and the Doctor are surrounded by the plants. Lasky tries to reason with them, but they kill her and take her body back to their lair. Escaping through the air ducts, Mel and the Doctor discover the pile of bodies. The Doctor has an idea that vionesium, the rare metal taken from Mogar stored in the ship's vault, would accelerate the Vervoids' life-cycle towards its natural end. Travers lowers the lighting and heating in the ship, forcing the Vervoids back to their lair, where the Doctor and Mel are waiting. They deploy the metal against the Vervoids, which causes the creatures' leaf-covered bodies to die. Having saved the survivors, the Doctor and Mel depart in the TARDIS. Back in the courtroom, the Inquisitor asks the Doctor if any of the Vervoids survived, and he informs her that none did; if even a leaf had survived and reached Earth, a Vervoid would have grown. Seizing on this, the Valeyard accuses the Doctor of committing genocide. 

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Brum is the story of a small replica car who ventures out into Big Town when his owner isn't looking, and gets up to all manner of adventures. Each episode begins and ends in the same way, with Brum leaving the other cars in the motor museum when the owner's back is turned and heading out to explore Big Town, before eventually returning to his place. Each series has had its own background music. From series 1-2 the introduction music was the same but in series 2 they used different instruments. From Series 3-5 the music became jazzy and a new Title sequence was Directed by Nigel P. Harris. The car can express himself in various mechanical ways including opening and closing his doors and bonnet, bobbing his suspension, and flashing and swivelling. The actors in Brum do not speak – mime and off-screen narration help propel the story. It was therefore easy to prepare episodes for airing in other countries, and the series has been broadcast in many parts of the world and in many languages. The stories are set in the city of Birmingham, England, since in addition to its onomatopoeic nature of a car engine revving, Brum (as a contraction of "Brummagem") is a common colloquial name for Birmingham. Although later series make no direct mention of Birmingham, calling it simply Big Town, many of the city's streets and landmarks can be seen in each episode. The show was written by a range of writers. Anne Wood primarily wrote all the first series, while the second was written by Tom Poole, Dirk Campbell, Andrew Davenport and Morgan Hall. The last two series were written by Nigel P. Harris (5 Episodes) and the existing Ragdoll team. The car itself – a half-scale replica of a late-1920s Austin 7 Chummy convertible – was designed and built by Rex Garrod. It is now housed at the Cotswold Motoring Museum in Bourton-on-the-Water, Gloucestershire, which is also where the opening and closing sequences of the programme were filmed. 

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As the crew watch a supernova, Fry puts a metal pan of popcorn into the ship's microwave oven. The radiation causes the pan to emit sparks, which interact with the particles thrown off by the supernova and send the ship back to 1947. Since GPS technology does not yet exist in this time period, the crew have no way to navigate the ship accurately and crash-land in Roswell, New Mexico. Refusing to wear a seat belt like the rest of the crew, Bender is flung through the windshield on impact and smashed to pieces. The crew and Bender's disembodied head seek out a way to return to the 31st century, leaving Zoidberg behind to pick up the pieces. Zoidberg is captured by the U.S. military and taken to Roswell Air Base for experimentation. Assuming the pieces are the remnants of a flying saucer, the military "reconstructs" Bender's body as such. Meanwhile, the microwave oven needed to return to the future has been destroyed and a replacement is not yet commercially available. A microwave antenna from the army base would work as a viable alternative, but Professor Farnsworth warns that stealing it could change history. He likewise warns Fry against visiting his grandfather, Enos, who is stationed at the base, as he might kill Enos and erase his own existence. However, Farnsworth's advice has the opposite effect; Fry becomes determined to seek out Enos and encourage him to pursue a sexual relationship with his fiancée Mildred. After several bumbling attempts to keep Enos safe, Fry resorts to locking him in an abandoned house. The house turns out to be located in the middle of a nuclear weapon testing range, and Enos is killed in a bomb test. When Fry visits Mildred to console her on Enos' death, she begins to seduce him. Realizing that his existence has not been erased, he concludes that she cannot be his grandmother. The two have sex that night and are found by the rest of the crew the following morning. Seeing that Mildred has begun to act like his grandmother, Fry realizes to his horror that he has now become his own grandfather. With time running out, Farnsworth decides that secrecy is no longer important and the crew storm Roswell Air Base by force to get the microwave dish, throwing the entire complex into disarray. Fry and Leela rescue Zoidberg from an alien autopsy while Farnsworth grabs Bender's body. As the ship leaves Earth's atmosphere and triggers the microwave dish for the time jump, Bender's head falls out and has to be left behind in 1947. Back in the 31st century, Fry laments the loss of Bender, until he realizes that his head must still be where it landed in New Mexico. The crew return to Roswell's ruins with a metal detector and dig up the head, still intact and functioning. They attach it to Bender's still-mangled, hovering, "UFO" body and return to New New York, content that their misadventures in 1947 have not changed history in any way. 

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Architect Peter Mitchell (Tom Selleck), satirist Michael Kellam (Steve Guttenberg), and actor Jack Holden (Ted Danson) are happy bachelors in their shared New York City apartment, with frequent parties and flings with women. One day, a baby named Mary arrives on their doorstep with a note revealing she is the result of Jack’s tryst with an actress named Sylvia during a Stratford Festival Shakespearean production a year prior. Jack is in Turkey shooting a B movie, and made arrangements with a director friend to have a package delivered to the apartment. Jack asked Peter and Michael to keep the delivery a secret per his friend's wishes; when Mary arrives, they mistakenly believe she is the “package.” Peter and Michael are totally befuddled how to care for Mary, and Peter leaves to buy supplies. Their landlady Mrs. Hathaway (Cynthia Harris) delivers a small box – the actual "package" of heroin – which Michael tosses aside. Peter and Michael learn to properly care for Mary, including diaper changes, baths, and feedings. The next day, two drug dealers arrive at the apartment to retrieve the package. Peter and Michael mistakenly give them Mary, along with a can of powdered milk the dealers believe is the heroin. Peter discovers the actual package; realizing the mix-up, he runs downstairs but trips, spilling the package's contents. He gathers up the drugs and confronts the men outside, causing a scuffle. A police officer on horseback intervenes; Peter rescues Mary, but the dealers flee with the can of powdered milk. The officer detains Peter and Michael at the apartment until Sgt. Melkowitz (Philip Bosco), a narcotics officer, arrives to question them. Jack calls from Turkey, but Peter and Michael are unable to talk openly as they are being recorded. They successfully hide the drugs and learn that Jack's friend Paul Milner is also a drug dealer. A suspicious Melkowitz puts them under surveillance. Mrs. Hathaway is persuaded to babysit Mary while Peter and Michael leave for work. Returning home, they find Mrs. Hathaway bound and gagged and the apartment ransacked by the dealers, but Mary safe; a note threatens, "Next time we'll take the baby". Peter and Michael continue to care for Mary, adjusting to surrogate fatherhood and growing attached to her. Peter incapacitates an intruder, who turns out to be Jack, returning early after his movie role was cut. Jack assures Peter and Michael he knew nothing about the heroin. He initially denies his connection to Mary, but Sylvia’s note convinces him he is Mary’s father. Peter and Michael pass all parenting responsibility to Jack, who quickly grows to love her. They receive a news clipping in the mail – Milner has been attacked by the drug dealers and hospitalized – with another threat: “Don't let this happen to you!” Peter, Michael, and Jack formulate a plan to trap the dealers, and arrange a meeting. Jack, disguised as a pregnant woman, leaves the building with Mary, while Peter and Michael leave in a cab, followed by undercover officers, but manage to lose them in another cab driven by Jack. The three meet the dealers at the top floor of a construction site. Michael, hidden in the vents, records Peter’s conversation with the dealers but falls into the room, and a chase ensues. They manage to trap the dealers in an elevator as the police arrive. With the recording, they prove their innocence to Melkowitz and the dealers are arrested. Peter, Michael, and Jack fully embrace their role as Mary's guardians, until Sylvia (Nancy Travis) arrives to take Mary with her to London. After Sylvia leaves with Mary, the three realize how desperately they miss the baby. They race to the airport just as Sylvia’s British Airways plane, a Boeing 747 called the City of Belfast, departs for London. Defeated, they return home to find Sylvia and Mary at the door. Sylvia tearfully explains she doesn’t want to give up her acting career but must if she has to raise Mary alone. The three invite her and Mary to move in with them; she accepts, and the four of them live happily with the baby. 

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Lady Britomart Undershaft, the daughter of a British earl, and her son Stephen discuss a source of income for her grown daughters Sarah, who is engaged to Charles Lomax (a slightly comic figure who continually stupidly says "Oh, I say!"), and Barbara, who is engaged to Adolphus Cusins (a scholar of Greek literature). Lady Britomart leads Stephen to accept her decision that they must ask her estranged husband, Andrew Undershaft, for financial help. Mr. Undershaft is a successful and wealthy businessman who has made millions of pounds from his munitions factory, which manufactures the world-famous Undershaft guns, cannons, torpedoes, submarines and aerial battleships. When their children were still small, the Undershafts separated; now grown, the children have not seen their father since, and Lady Britomart has raised them by herself. During their reunion, Undershaft learns that Barbara is a major in The Salvation Army who works at their shelter in West Ham, east London. Barbara and Mr. Undershaft agree that he will visit Barbara's Army shelter, if she will then visit his munitions factory. A subplot involves the down-and-out and fractious visitors to the shelter, including a layabout painter and con artist (Snobby Price), a poor housewife feigning to be a fallen woman (Rummy Mitchens), an older laborer fired for his age (Peter Shirley), and a pugnacious bully (Bill Walker) who threatens the inhabitants and staff over his runaway partner, striking a frightened care worker (Jenny Hill). When he visits the shelter, Mr. Undershaft is impressed with Barbara's handling of these various troublesome people who seek social services from the Salvation Army: she treats them with patience, firmness, and sincerity. Undershaft and Cusins discuss the question of Barbara's commitment to The Salvation Army, and Undershaft decides he must overcome Barbara's moral horror of his occupation. He declares that he will therefore "buy" (off) the Salvation Army. He makes a sizeable donation, matching another donation from a whisky distiller. Barbara wants the Salvation Army to refuse the money because it comes from the armaments and alcohol industries, but her supervising officer eagerly accepts it. Barbara sadly leaves the shelter in disillusionment, while Cusins views Undershaft's actions both with disgust and sarcastic pleasure. According to tradition, the heir to the Undershaft fortune must be an orphan who can be groomed to run the factory. Lady Britomart tries to convince Undershaft to bequeath the business to his son Stephen, but neither male consents. Undershaft says that the best way to keep the factory in the family is to find a foundling and marry him to Barbara. Later, Barbara and the rest of her family accompany her father to his munitions factory. They are all impressed by its size and organisation. Cusins declares that he is a foundling, and is thus eligible to inherit the business. Undershaft eventually overcomes Cusins' moral scruples about the nature of the business, arguing that paying his employees provides a much higher service to them than Barbara's Army service, which only prolongs their poverty; as an example, the firm has hired Peter. Cusins' gradual acceptance of Undershaft's logic makes Barbara more content to marry him, not less, because bringing a message of salvation to the factory workers, rather than to London slum-dwellers, will bring her more fulfilment. 

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Elements of episodes 6 and 7 ("Supermass" and "Deathship"), featuring the appearance of the artificial black hole Spaceguard Six which draws in the Challenger, have plot similarities to the Blake's 7 episode "Dawn of the Gods". This episode (also penned by Follett and first broadcast on BBC Television on 28 January 1980) features an artificial black hole which draws in the Liberator and in which the crew wake up surrounded by captured ships. The plot of the first series is also somewhat similar to the Space:1999 episode "Mission of the Darians", in which the Alphans discover an enormous spacecraft whose inhabitants have descended into barbarism after an environmental disaster on board the spaceship. 

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The Thin Blue Line is set in the police station of the fictional English town of Gasforth. One of the main themes shows the uniformed squad led by Inspector Fowler and the CID led by Detective Inspector Grim locking horns over similar, or even the same, issues while having conflicting views or methods of operation. Generally the uniformed section triumphs over the detectives, although not without their own foibles. Although other PCs and staff than the main characters are visible in the background and at meetings they generally have no speaking parts. 

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Tomb of Horrors is set in the World of Greyhawk, a D&D; campaign setting. In Tomb of Horrors, the adventurers encounter a number of tricks and traps while attempting to penetrate the tomb of a dead wizard. As the scenario begins, the players are told that the evil wizard Acererak is said to linger in his ancient tomb in undead form. Originally a powerful lich, he has (unbeknownst to the players) become a demi-lich, a more powerful form of undead that has transcended the need for any physical body apart from its skull. Player characters must survive the deadly traps in the tomb and fight their way into the demi-lich's elaborately concealed inner sanctum to destroy him once and for all. The module is divided into thirty-three encounters, beginning with two false entrances to the tomb, and ending with "The Crypt of Acererak the Demi-Lich." Example encounters are the "Huge Pit Filled with 200 Spikes" (section 20), or encounter 22, "The Cavern of Gold and Silver Mists": "The mists are silvery and shot through with delicate streamers of golden color. Vision extends only 6'. There is a dim aura of good if detected for. Those who step into the mist must save versus poison or become idiots until they can breathe the clean air above ground under the warm sun." The module ends with the destruction of Acererak without any postscript. 

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D wanders through a far-future post-nuclear Earth that combines elements of pulp genres: western, science fiction, horror and Lovecraftian horror, high fantasy, folklore and occult science. The planet, once terrified by the elegant but cruel Nobles (vampires), ancient demons, mutants and their technological creations, is now slowly returning to a semblance of order and human control—thanks in part to the decadence that brought about the downfall of the vampire race, to the continued stubbornness of frontier dwellers, and to the rise of a caste of independent hunters-for- hire who eliminate supernatural threats. Some time in 1999, a nuclear war occurred. The Nobility were vampires that planned for a possible nuclear war and sequestered all that was needed to rebuild civilization in their shelters. They use their science combined with magic to restore the world in their image. Nearly all magical creatures are engineered, with a very small number being demons who survived the holocaust. Despite their technology being great enough to create a blood substitute as food, they still prefer to feed on humans. As such, they create a civilization where vampires and humans coexist, eventually developing the planet into parklands and cities. The society eventually stagnates when vampire technology perfects scientific prophecy, which determines they are at their zenith of existence and thus are doomed to fall, overthrown by humans. The human race was also transformed at this time, with fear for the vampires being woven into their genetics, and the inability to remember vampire weaknesses such as garlic and crucifixes. Unlike vampires from traditional lore, the Nobility have the ability to reproduce sexually, although their offspring will permanently cease aging after reaching physical maturity, having inherited their vampire parent's immortality. 

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Dan Holiday is drugged and winds up in an asylum. The staff try to convince him he's someone he isn't. It is part of a scam to claim an inheritance. 

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The novel is set in West Germany and East Germany in the months of August and September; the year is unspecified. Team Yankee ("Y" in the ICAO and NATO phonetic alphabet) is an armor-heavy company-sized unit (a "Team" in Army parlance). There is nothing special about this team; it is an average company- sized U.S. unit in an average battalion of the Regular Army. Team Yankee is composed of First Platoon (Lieutenant Murray Weiss), Second Platoon (Second Lieutenant McAllister), Mech(anized Infantry) Platoon (Staff Sergeant Polgar), and Third Platoon (Second Lieutenant Gerry Garger). Captain Sean Bannon is company commander; First Lieutenant Robert Uleski is the executive officer; and company first sergeant is First Sergeant Raymond Harrert. Captain Bannon is 27 years old, married and has three children. He studied military history, with a graduate degree, but is seen as an average officer; Coyle notes in the preface that Bannon will probably never rise in rank above lieutenant colonel. The team has 10 M1 Abrams tanks, 5 M113 armored personnel carriers, and 2 M901 ITV TOW missile vehicles. The infantry is armed with Dragon antitank missiles and 66-millimeter LAWs. The Team also has a M113 AMEV (Armored Medical Evacuation Vehicle) and an M88 recovery vehicle. There are four M1s in each tank platoon, numbered 11, 12, 13, 14, 21... to 34. The XO's tank is numbered 55; the CO's tank 66. The parent unit of Team Yankee is the First Battalion, 4th Armor. Currently it is part of Task Force 3-78 Mechanized Infantry, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Reynolds. TF 3-78 is formed from the First Battalion, 78th Infantry. The brigade commander is Colonel Brunn. The task force is composed of Team Yankee, C Company (Captain Craven) a standard infantry company, D Company, and another armor-heavy Team Bravo. In addition, there is an artillery support team (a FIST) (Second Lieutenant Rodney Unger) attached. 

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In post-apocalyptic Australia, Max Rockatansky is crossing the desert in a camel-drawn V8 wagon when he is attacked by a Transavia PL-12 Airtruk piloted by a man named Jedediah and his son. They steal his wagon and belongings, and Max continues on foot, following their trail to a survivor community named 'Bartertown' - which has rebuilt ramshackle vestiges of basic civilization, even electricity. Initially refused entry because he has nothing to trade, Max is brought before the founder and ruler of Bartertown, the ruthless Aunty Entity. She offers to resupply his vehicle and equipment if he completes a task for her. Aunty explains that Bartertown’s electrical supply depends on a crude methane refinery powered by pig feces. The refinery is run by a dwarf called Master and his giant bodyguard Blaster. "Master Blaster" holds an uneasy truce with Aunty for control of Bartertown; however, Master has begun to challenge Aunty's leadership. Aunty instructs Max to provoke a confrontation with Blaster. According to Bartertown law, conflicts are resolved by a duel to the death in a gladiatorial arena called Thunderdome. Max enters the subterranean Underworld refinery area to size up Master Blaster and befriends Pig Killer, a convict sentenced to work for slaughtering a pig to feed his family. Max finds his stolen vehicle in Master/Blaster's possession and is forced to disarm his own booby-trapped engine. Here he discovers that although Blaster is exceptionally strong, he is hypersensitive to high-pitched noises, which severely disorient and incapacitate him. Accusing Master of the theft of his vehicle, Max provokes him into demanding justice for the insult by entering Blaster into a Thunderdome duel with Max. Blaster dominates the duel until Max is able to use his bosun's whistle to gain the upper hand. Poised to kill Blaster, Max knocks his helmet off and is shocked to discover that Blaster has Down syndrome. Max refuses to kill a man with "the mind of a child" and confronts Aunty for deceiving him, thus exposing her plot. Master, previously unaware of this arrangement to kill Blaster, is furious and vows to shut down the refinery and, by extension, Bartertown. Aunty has Blaster killed, Master imprisoned, and Max exiled. He is bound on a horse and sent off in a random direction through the wasteland. When his mount perishes in a sinkhole, Max frees himself and presses on. Near death, Max is found by a desert dweller named Savannah Nix, who hauls him back to her home, "Planet Erf", a primitive community of children and teenagers who live in an oasis. The children, descended from survivors of a crashed Boeing 747, were left by their parents who went to find civilization. They believe Max to be the flight captain, G. L. Walker, returned to fix the aeroplane and fly them to civilization. Max denies this and insists that they remain in the relative safety of the oasis, knowing that the only "civilization" within reach is Bartertown. Some of the children, led by Savannah, leave anyway, determined to find the prophesied "Tomorrow-morrow Land." Max stops them by force, but another tribe member, Scrooloose, sets them free during the night and leaves with them. Their leader, Slake M'Thirst, asks Max to go after them, and he agrees, taking a few of the children with him to help. They find Savannah's group in danger but are unable to save one of the children from a sinkhole. With no supplies left, they are forced to head for Bartertown. The group sneak in via an underground entrance, and, with Pig Killer's help, free Master and escape in a train- truck, destroying Bartertown's methane refinery in the process. Aunty leads the Imperial Guards in pursuit chasing in their postmodern vehicles, catching up to the train. Max's group slows them down while Scrooloose hijacks one of the pursuing vehicles. The group comes across Jedediah and his son, and Max coerces Jedediah into helping his group escape with their aeroplane. Max uses his vehicle to clear a path through Aunty's men, allowing the aeroplane to take off and escape, leaving him at Aunty's mercy. Aunty spares his life, having come to respect him, and departs to presumably make good on her vow to rebuild Bartertown. Jedediah flies the children to the coast, where they discover the nuclear-devastated ruins of Sydney. Years later, the children have established a small society of themselves and other lost wanderers in the ruins. Savannah, now leader of the group, recites a nightly story of their journey and the man who saved them, as Max, still alive in the desert, wanders on to places unknown. 

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At the time when the book is set, "jaunting"--personal teleportation--has so upset the social and economic balance that the Inner Planets are at war with the Outer Satellites. Gully Foyle of the Presteign-owned merchant spaceship Nomad--an uneducated, unskilled, unambitious man whose life is at a dead end--is marooned in space when the ship is attacked and he alone survives. After six months of his waiting for rescue, a passing spaceship, the Vorga, also owned by the powerful Presteign industrial clan, ignores his signal and abandons him. Foyle is enraged and is transformed into a man consumed by revenge, the first of many transformations. Foyle repairs the ship, but is captured by a cargo cult in the Asteroid Belt which tattoos a hideous mask of a tiger on his face. He manages to escape and is returned to Terra. His attempt to blow up the Vorga fails, and he is captured by Presteign. Unknown to Foyle, the Nomad was carrying "PyrE", a new material which could make the difference between victory and defeat in the war. Presteign hires Saul Dagenham to interrogate Foyle and find the ship and PyrE. Protected by his own revenge fixation, Foyle cannot be broken, and he is put into a jaunte-proof prison. There he meets Jisbella McQueen, who teaches him to think clearly, and tells him he should find out who gave the order not to rescue him. Together they escape and get his tattoos removed--but not with total success: the subcutaneous scars become visible when Foyle becomes too emotional. They travel to the Nomad, where they recover not only PyrE, but also a fortune in platinum. Jisbella is captured by Dagenham, but Foyle escapes. Some time later, Foyle re-emerges as "Geoffrey Fourmyle", a nouveau riche dandy. Foyle has rigorously educated himself and had his body altered to become a killing machine. Through yoga he has achieved the emotional self-control necessary to prevent his stigmata from showing. He seeks out Robin Wednesbury, a one-way telepath, whom he had raped earlier in the novel, and persuades her to help him charm his way through high society. Foyle tracks down the crew of the Vorga to learn the identity of the ship's captain, but each is implanted with a death-reflex and dies when questioned. Each time, Foyle is tormented by the appearance of "The Burning Man", an image of himself on fire. At a society party, Foyle is smitten with Presteign's daughter Olivia. He also meets Jisbella again--now Dagenham's lover--who chooses not to reveal Foyle's identity, although Dagenham has realized it anyway (Foyle's alias was implanted in his subconscious mind during Dagenham's interrogation). During a nuclear attack by the Outer Satellites, Foyle goes to Olivia to save her. She tells him that to have her, he must be as cruel and ruthless as she is. Robin, traumatized by the attacks, tries to buy her way out of her arrangement with Foyle with the name of another Vorga crew member. Foyle agrees, but immediately reneges. In response, Robin goes to Central Intelligence to betray him. Foyle learns that the captain of the Vorga joined a cult on Mars and has had all her sensory nerves disabled, making her immune to conventional torture. Foyle kidnaps a telepath to interrogate the captain, and learns that the ship did not rescue him because it was picking up refugees, taking their belongings, and scuttling them into space. He also learns that Olivia Presteign was the person in charge. Olivia rescues him from Martian commandos, as she sees in Foyle someone who can match her hatred and need to destroy. Driven by a guilty conscience, Foyle tries to give himself up, but is captured by Presteign's lawyer Regis Sheffield, who turns out to be a spy for the Outer Satellites. Sheffield tells Foyle that when the Nomad was attacked, Foyle was taken off the ship, transported 600,000 miles away, and set adrift in a spacesuit to be a decoy to attract ships to be ambushed. Instead, Foyle space-jaunted--teleporting a cosmic distance, very much further than had been previously believed possible--back to the Nomad. Now, the Outer Satellites not only want PyrE, they want Foyle as well, to learn the secret of space-jaunting. Meanwhile, Presteign reveals that PyrE is activated by telepathy, and Robin is enlisted to trigger it to flush out Foyle. Bits of PyrE left exposed by Foyle's tests to determine its purpose cause destruction worldwide, but primarily at Foyle's abandoned encampment in St. Patrick's Cathedral, where Sheffield has brought him. The church partially collapses, killing Sheffield and trapping Foyle, unconscious but alive, over a pit of flame. Suffering from synesthesia brought on by the explosion affecting his neurological implants, Foyle jauntes through space and time as The Burning Man. Finally he lands in the future, where Robin telepathically tells him how to escape from the collapsing cathedral. Back in the present, Foyle is pressured to surrender the rest of the PyrE, which was protected from exploding by its Inert Lead Isotope container, and to teach mankind how to space-jaunte. He leads them to where the rest of the PyrE is hidden, but makes off with it and jauntes across the globe, throwing slugs of PyrE into the crowd at each stop. He asks humanity to choose: either destroy itself or follow him into space. Foyle now realizes the key to space-jaunting is faith: not the certainty of an answer, but the conviction that somewhere an answer exists. He jauntes from one nearby star to another, finding new worlds suitable for colonization, but reachable only if he shares the secret of space-jaunting. He comes to rest back with the cargo cult, where the people see him as a holy man and await his revelation. 

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Like many other Burroughs stories, A Fighting Man of Mars resembles The Arabian Nights. The story is purportedly relayed back to earth via the Gridley Wave, a sort of super radio frequency previously introduced in Tanar of Pellucidar, the third of Burrough's Pellucidar novels, which thus provides a link between the two series. The story-teller is Ulysses Paxton, protagonist of the previous novel, The Master Mind of Mars, but this story is not about him; rather, it is the tale of Tan Hadron of Hastor, a lowly, poor padwar (a low-ranking officer) who is in love with the beautiful, haughty Sanoma Tora, daughter of Tor Hatan, a minor but rich noble. As he is only a padwar, Sanoma spurns him. Then Sanoma Tora is kidnapped, and the novel moves into high gear. As Tan Hadron crosses Mars ("Barsoom", as Burroughs calls it) searching for Sanoma Tora, he encounters some of Barsoom's most ferocious beasts: huge, many-armed, flesh-eating white apes, gigantic spiders, and the insane cannibals of U-Gor. He also meets the mad scientist Phor Tak, who cackles "Heigh-oo!" and is crazed with the desire for revenge. The initial simplicity of Burroughs' well-worn pursuit plot is elaborated by Hadron's rescue of an escaped slave, Tavia, from a band of six-limbed Green Martians of Torquas, en route to the city of Jahar where Hadron believes Sanoma Tora has been taken. Tavia is an atypical Burroughs heroine; depicted as self-reliant and competent with weapons, witty and intelligent, she compares favorably for both reader and Hadron with beautiful but shallow Sanoma Tora, who ultimately shows herself unworthy of the virtuous hero. With the addition of Nur An, a disaffected Jaharian warrior, and another escaped woman slave, Phao, Hadron's quest becomes more collaborative than Burroughs' usual, although Tavia, in an unsurprising plot development, is revealed to be a princess at the end. 

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A scientific expedition to the planet Saturn in 2025, aboard the ship Ringmaster, discovers a strange satellite in orbit around the planet. Commanding the ship is Cirocco Jones, a tall NASA career woman, aided by astronomer Gaby Plauget, the clone twin physicists April and August Polo, pilot Eugene Springfield, physician Calvin Greene and engineer Bill (whose last name is never given). As they reach the satellite they realize it is a huge hollow torus, a Stanford torus habitat. Before they can report this the ship is entangled in cables from the object. The crew is rendered unconscious and later wake up inside the habitat. Initially separated, Cirroco and Gaby find each other and travel together through the world inside the torus to find the rest of the crew. As the story progresses, they find Calvin living as a companion inside a Blimp, an intelligent gasbag a kilometer long, one of many that swim forever in the air inside the habitat. Calvin can speak to the blimp and understand its responses, which consist of whistles. His blimp's name is Whistlestop, in human terms. Calvin helps Gaby and Cirocco find the other crew members (except April). He ultimately decides to leave his human companions to live with the blimp permanently. The remaining companions encounter the Titanides, strange centaur-like beings who speak a language based on music. Cirocco finds she has the ability to speak their language. The Titanides are in a perpetual state of war with the Angels, birdlike humanoid creatures. They fight because of an impulse that occurs when they are near each other, but do not know why they have the impulse. The humans learn from the Titanides that there is a controlling intelligence, called Gaea, and it lives 600 km above them, in the hub of the torus. Cirocco, Gaby, and Gene decide to climb up to this place using the support cables that maintain the structure against centrifugal force. During the journey, Gene's behavior becomes increasingly erratic. He rapes Gaby and then rapes Cirocco. He thinks he killed Gaby while he gives chase to Cirocco only Gaby is not dead and eventually cuts his ear off with a hatchet. After he passes out Gaby destroys his face. They get rid of him and keep going. Months of climbing brings them high in one of the spokes of the great wheel. There they find April, who has been transformed into an angel. She, like the other Angels, is solitary by nature, and can hardly bear to be near them. Finally reaching the hub, they discover Gaea, who presents herself as a frumpy middle aged woman. She explains that the great wheel is very old, and some of the regional intelligences around the rim have rebelled against the center. It was, in fact, one of these regional intelligences that had captured the Ringmaster and altered its crew. Gaea rescued them and, unable to change them back, placed them where they would be happy. She makes an offer to Cirocco: in exchange for long life and unusual abilities, she can be Gaea's agent at the Rim, her Wizard. Cirocco accepts, with the condition that the war between the Titanides and Angels must stop. Gaea's personality is that of a movie addict. She has been watching television signals from Earth and is obsessed by movies, especially from Hollywood's Golden Age. The Titanide-Angel war was the result of her having seen war movies, and realizing that humanity will inevitably declare war on her. The war is a way for her to practice. 

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In the distant future, thousands of years after a great war between humans and their biologically engineered weapons, humans live in everything from small tribes to large nations. One nation, the Empire, has discovered a black tower in the middle of a lake near their capital, which gave them access to large amounts of ancient weapons which they used to beat back and control the ever present monsters in the world. The Imperials were corrupted by this power and became conquerors of others as opposed to liberators from a violent world. The introduction movie opens with the protagonist, Keil Fluge (unnamed in the North American version), hunting in a canyon. After seeing an Imperial flying battleship in the sky, he is attacked by two creatures and chases one of them to a large, ancient complex built directly into the rock. He explores the ruin, and sees relics of old technology still hanging from the ceilings. Another gigantic creature suddenly attacks him, and though his weapon is useless against the armored creature, a rumbling triggers a cave in, which crushes the monster and saves Keil. From the newly created hole, an armored, blue dragon flies down the cavern with a rider across its shoulders, being chased by an even bigger black dragon as the cavern is destroyed in an explosion. Regaining consciousness outside, Keil sees the two dragons locked in combat in the air before him. Dodging a blast from the black dragon, the blue dragon's rider is then hit by single shot to the chest, and the black dragon flies away. The blue dragon flies towards Keil. A psychic connection is made between the rider and Keil, who is told not to let the black dragon reach the black tower. The rider then dies and Keil picks up his fallen gun, climbs atop the dragon and flies away, determined to finish the rider's quest. During the first level of the game, Keil and his dragon fly through a drowned city, where they encounter a small Imperial patrol ship. That ship sends a report to a large fleet of ships flying above the clouds. It is revealed that the Imperial forces are specifically searching for the blue dragon. The second level is a desert, where Keil and the dragon encounter gigantic worm-like creatures. At the stormy edge of the desert, they are confronted by the Black Dragon, which is defeated and speeds away. The third level is a mountainous landscape at night-time where Keil and the dragon get reacquainted with the Imperial forces, which were exploring ancient ruins. These encounters illustrate the ongoing conflict between the Imperial forces and the ancient machines and creatures. The fourth level is an ancient facility in which Keil and the dragon are pursued by both Imperial airships and cybernetic sentinels left behind by the ancient civilization. During the fifth level, they defeat a large armada of the most powerful Imperial ships over a forested area. A cutscene then shows a fleet of dragon-like creatures coming out of the tower to attack the Imperial forces. The sixth level features the black dragon and Keil racing through the battle-scarred Imperial capital. During this, they are both waylaid by the creatures and machines seen attacking the Imperial fleet around the tower while also being fired on by Imperial defenses. The black dragon then reaches the Tower and is mutated into a gigantic super-dragon and begins a climactic battle with Keil and the blue dragon, after which the black dragon is defeated and falls into the ocean. In the ending cutscene, Keil and the dragon enter the tower. While traveling down a long corridor, the dragon surrounds Keil in a force field, lifting him from the saddle and suspending him in the hallway. Keil watches as the dragon continues on to the core of the tower, then a blinding light is seen and the tower explodes. Keil wakes up some time later in a desert area abutting the ocean. Looking down, he sees the foot prints of the blue dragon around him, indicating that after the explosion, the dragon carried him to safety and flew away. 

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The novel is written in the first-person, continuing the aesthetic of Ellis' earlier Less Than Zero, and is told from the points of view of multiple characters. The main narrators are three students: Paul, Sean, and Lauren. A number of other characters also provide first-hand accounts throughout the story, which takes place at the fictional Camden College, a liberal arts school on the East Coast of the United States. The three main characters (who rarely attend class) end up in a love triangle within a sequence of drug runs, "Dressed to Get Screwed" parties, and "End of the World" parties. The story begins and ends midway through a sentence (the first word in the book being 'and', the last words are 'and she') in order to give the effect that it begins somewhere closer to the middle, rather than at a true beginning (in medias res). Another interpretation is that the story has neither a beginning nor an ending, signifying the endless cycle of debauchery in which the characters of the novel engage. This is sometimes mistaken by readers as a typographical error or the result of a missing page, but was purposely written by Ellis. The novel ends in a similar fashion, with the last sentence cut off before its end. 

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In the Northland town of Kaitaia in spring 1978,Title card: "Kataia[,] Spring 1978" nineteen-year-old Gerry Austin (Kelly Johnson) opportunistically steals a wallet and uses the cash and driver's licence inside to rent a yellow Mini. With no particular aim in mind, he drifts down to Auckland. Meanwhile, in Auckland, the middle-aged John (Tony Barry), has just had Sue, his girlfriend of six years, walk out on him and fly home to Invercargill. After a night on the bottle, John decides to go down to Invercargill. Searching for transport, John notices Gerry being stopped by a traffic officer for failing to wear a seat belt. John intervenes and manages to get the officer off writing a ticket. As thanks, Gerry offers John a lift part of the way. The duo stop for petrol in the northern Waikato, but accidentally drive off without paying, drawing police attention to the car. Further down the road, Gerry and John pick up Shirl (Claire Oberman), who is heading to Wanganui, and after informing the duo that she is a virgin, Gerry makes a bet that this will change before reaching Wanganui. After failing to pay for petrol on purpose in the central North Island, they are pursued by a motorcycle officer, with the duo ending up avoiding arrest by driving into a car wreckers. On the road to Wanganui, the trio discuss about whether Gerry had sex with Shirl or not when he tried to silence her in the chase beforehand. However, the discussion ends in a stalemate. Shirl doesn't leave at Wanganui, and decides to stay with the guys and go to Wellington. In Wellington, the trio meet Mulvaney (Bruno Lawrence), an old associate of John's, who gives the trio overnight accommodation at his garage and supplies them with money and drugs in return for parts of the car. Leaving for the inter-island ferry the next morning, Gerry runs a red light and is immediately pursued by the police through central Wellington. The trio avoid the police by driving through the Wellington railway station and stowing the Mini in an empty boxcar being shunted onto the ferry. Arriving in Picton in the South Island, the boxcar is attached to a train destined for Christchurch, and the trio enjoy a leisurely ride, decorating the wagon with the name "Blondini" and other items found in the train's wagons. After a night of partying, Gerry finally wins his bet with Shirl. Arriving in Christchurch in the morning, the trio finds out the wagon is not leaving the city for the West Coast until that night, so spend the day on the town. Gerry and John return to the train, but notices Shirl is not there, and the train leaves without her. After leaving the train, Gerry and John stop at a tearoom further down the coast. They find out from the television that Shirl was arrested for shoplifting, and that they're wanted in a national man-hunt of the "Blondini Gang". Crossing back over the Southern Alps, the Mini is pursued by a determined police officer (Marshall Napier) down the Lake Hāwea shoreline. He almost catches Gerry and John, but ends up driving off the road and down the bank trying to avoid a combine harvester blocking the road. The duo sell more parts off the car at Cromwell, but as they are short-changed John takes a full petrol can as extra payment. At Dunedin, the duo meet Snout, who helps them avoid a police roadblock and buys more parts off the car. However, after he learns they're heading for Invercargill, he tips them off to the police. Stopping for conveniences, John is spotted by police; unable to find Gerry, he drives off in the Mini, not realising Gerry is underneath the car trying to remove the muffler. Gerry is arrested, but manages to escape from the police car and jumps on top of the fleeing Mini. The police try to PIT the Mini, and Gerry falls off and is hit by the pursuing police car. John says goodbye to Gerry, who is severely injured, then takes the car and proceeds to Invercargill. John encounters a roadblock at the entrance to Invercargill and diverts through a cemetery to avoid it, but not before the Armed Offenders Squad shoots a hole in the Cromwell fuel can, spilling the petrol. Approaching Sue's house, the insecure exhaust dragging along the road ignites the fuel, setting it alight. John reunites with Sue, but their reunion is short-lived when the burning Mini draws the attention of emergency services. With police surrounding the house, John finally admits defeat and surrenders himself. 

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Annelle Dupuy (Daryl Hannah), a shy, awkward beauty school graduate, moves to a northwestern Louisiana town where Truvy Jones (Dolly Parton) hires her to work in her home-based beauty salon. Meanwhile, M'Lynn Eatenton (Sally Field) and her daughter, Shelby (Julia Roberts), busily prepare for Shelby's wedding that is being held later that day. They, and Clairee Belcher (Olympia Dukakis), the former mayor's cheerful widow, arrive at Truvy's to have their hair done. While there, Shelby, who has type 1 diabetes, suffers a hypoglycemic attack, but recovers quickly with the women's help. M'Lynn reveals that due to Shelby's medical condition, her doctor advises against her having children. Shelby had considered ending her engagement to her fiancé, Jackson (Dylan McDermott), so he would not be deprived of children. Grouchy and sarcastic Louisa "Ouiser" Boudreaux (Shirley MacLaine) arrives at the salon and immediately begins interrogating Annelle about her background. Annelle tearfully reveals that her no-good husband, Bunkie, is evading the police and has taken all their money and the car. Annelle further admits she is unsure her marriage is legal. Shelby, sympathetic, invites Annelle to the wedding reception where she meets bartender Sammy DeSoto. Soon after, Annelle, following a short-lived wild streak, becomes deeply religious, annoying everyone, including Sammy. During the Christmas holidays, Shelby announces she is pregnant. Everyone is thrilled except for M’Lynn, knowing it is too risky. Truvy encourages M'Lynn to instead focus on the joy a new baby brings. Shelby has a baby boy, Jackson Jr., but soon develops kidney failure requiring regular dialysis. Around Jackson Jr.'s first birthday, Shelby undergoes a successful transplant with M'Lynn's donated kidney. Shelby recovers but four months later, Jackson arrives home to find her unconscious. Shelby is comatose, having contracted an infection in her central nervous system due to the suppressive therapy that keeps her body from rejecting the kidney. After doctors determine Shelby's condition is irreversible, the family jointly decide to remove her life support. After the funeral, M'Lynn breaks down but the other women comfort her. M'Lynn gradually accepts her daughter's decision to have risked her life in return for a few special years of motherhood and decides to focus her energy on helping Jackson raising Jack Jr. Annelle, now married to Sammy and pregnant, tells M'Lynn she wants to name her own baby after Shelby, as she was the reason she and Sammy met. M'Lynn approves, stating, "Life goes on." At the town Easter egg hunt, Annelle goes into labor and is rushed to the hospital and another life begins. 

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Mary (Katharine Hepburn), by assuming her throne as queen of Scotland, strikes terror into the heart of Queen Elizabeth I (Florence Eldridge). After languishing in jail for 18 years at Elizabeth's command, Mary is offered a pardon if she will sign away her throne. Will she accept the deal, or die instead? 

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In 1945, in Las Vegas, World War II veteran Frank Harris returns to his mother and invites her to a ride on his motorcycle. The two are involved in a traffic collision; Frank's mother dies, while Frank is transported to an animated realm called the "Cool World". In 1992, cartoonist Jack Deebs is serving a 10-year prison sentence for the murder of a man he had found in bed with his wife. During his sentence, he has visions of the Cool World and the femme fatale Holli Would, who seems to beckon him. Jack spends his sentence creating a series of comics based on his visions. Meanwhile, Frank has become a detective in the Cool World and keeps his eye on Holli to ensure that the two worlds do not intertwine. Shortly after his release from prison, Jack is transported into the Cool World and smuggled into a local nightclub by Holli and her henchmen, the Goons. Frank aggressively confronts Jack, explaining to him that the Cool World has existed long before Jack created the comic series. He also informs Jack that his fountain pen is a lethal weapon in the Cool World, and warns him that sexual intercourse between "noids" (humans from the real world) and "doodles" (the inhabitants of Cool World) is forbidden, as this can break the fabric between the two dimensions. Despite this, Frank himself is in love with the doodle Lonette, but limits himself to platonic advances. Holli later seduces Jack and makes love to him, which transforms her into a noid. Holli then secretly steals Jack's pen, which she uses to entrap Frank's partner Nails the Spider when he attempts to stop her. Jack and Holli leave for the real world, where Holli finds herself experiencing real sensations. Due to the damaged interdimensional fabric, Jack and Holli spontaneously flicker in between their doodle and noid forms. While contemplating their situation, Holli tells Jack about the "Spike of Power", an artifact that was the cause of Frank being transported to Cool World and was placed on the top of the Union Plaza Hotel by a doodle who crossed into the real world, and admits she wants to use it to remain in her noid form permanently. When Jack displays skepticism about the idea, Holli abandons Jack to search for the spike on her own. Frank learns what has happened and goes to the real world, where he teams up with Jack in a bid to stop Holli. They arrive at the casino and climb to the roof, where Holli kills Frank by pushing him off the building and seizes the Spike. A multitude of monstrous doodles begin pouring into the real world and begin turning noids in the city into doodles. The Spike also transforms Jack into an muscular superhero-like doodle, who returns the Spike to its rightful place, sending him, Holli and the invading doodles back to Cool World and restoring the balance between the two dimensions. Nails, having been freed from Jack's pen in the ensuing chaos, brings Frank's body back to Cool World. As Lonette mourns him, she finds out from Nails that Holli was briefly in her doodle form when she killed Frank and explains that when a noid is killed by a doodle, the noid is reborn in Cool World as a doodle. Sure enough, Frank is then revived as a doodle, allowing him to continue his relationship with Lonette. Meanwhile, Jack (who is still in his doodle form) and Holli are last seen as Jack begins planning their new life together, much to Holli's dismay. 

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Brian Kessler is a graduate student and journalist whose article about serial killers has gotten him an offer for a book deal from a publisher. He and his girlfriend Carrie Laughlin, an avant garde photographer, decide to relocate to California in hopes of enriching their careers. The two plot their journey from Louisville, Kentucky to Los Angeles, planning to visit infamous murder sites along the way which Carrie can photograph for Brian's book. Short on funds, Brian posts a ride-share ad on the university campus. Meanwhile, psychopathic parolee Early Grayce has just lost his job. His parole officer learns of this and comes to the trailer park where Early lives with his naïve, developmentally-delayed girlfriend Adele Corners. Early refuses the officer's offer of a job as a janitor at the university, saying he wants to leave the state, but the officer pressures him into keeping his appointment for the job interview. When Early arrives at the campus, he sees the ride-share ad and calls Brian, who agrees to meet him the following day. Early sends Adele ahead, then murders his landlord before joining her to wait for Brian and Carrie. Carrie is reluctant about riding with the couple given their rough appearance, but Brian encourages her to give them a chance. On the road, unbeknown to his companions, Early murders a man in a gas station bathroom and steals his money. When they arrive at their first hotel, Early cuts Adele's long hair shorter to try to match Carrie's. At another hotel, Early invites Brian out to play pool, leaving Adele and Carrie alone together. Adele explains that her mother did not approve of her relationship, because Early had just been released from prison. Adele reveals to Carrie that she suffered a vicious gang rape and that she views Early as her protector, even though he sometimes "punishes" her. While Carrie and Adele drink beer, Adele also admits to Carrie that Early forbids her to smoke or drink. Meanwhile, at a local bar, Early assaults a man who confronts Brian. Later on during the road-trip, Early introduces Brian to pistol shooting in a remote, unnamed location. Carrie is alarmed by Brian's growing fascination with Early, and by Brian's nonchalant response to the news that Early is a convicted felon. After catching Early and Adele having sex in the car, she gives Brian an ultimatum: either they rid themselves of the pair, or she will leave. At a desert gas station, Carrie glimpses a news report about Early being a suspected murderer. Early kills the gas station attendant in front of Carrie and continues the trip with the couple as hostages. At an abandoned mine camp, the party encounter two police officers, whom Early shoots and kills. They next come to the home of an elderly couple in the desert. Early beats the man to death, but Adele allows the woman to flee. When Early confronts Adele about letting the woman free, she hits him in the face with a cactus and chastises him, after which he shoots her to death. He then knocks Brian unconscious before kidnapping Carrie, driving her to the abandoned Dreamland nuclear testing site on the California-Nevada border. Early forces Carrie to dress in Adele's clothes and the film implies that he rapes her off-camera. Brian regains consciousness, and the elderly woman gives him the keys to her truck. Brian follows Early to the nuclear test site and attacks him, hitting him in the face with a shovel. Brian finds Carrie, who appears to be in shock, handcuffed to a bed in an abandoned house. Early, who was only stunned, attacks Brian and they struggle until Early is hit over the head by Carrie with the limb from a nuclear test mannequin. When Early continues the attack, Brian shoots and kills him. Some time later, Brian and Carrie are living in an oceanfront house in Malibu. As Brian sifts through tapes made with his voice recorder during their trip, Carrie tells him that a local gallery is interested in her art. Brian responds by suggesting they go out to celebrate. As they depart, Brian unintentionally leaves a recording running, which reveals a "thank you" message Adele covertly left at the end of a tape. 

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Ray Peterson is home on a week-long vacation. Late one night, he hears strange noises emanating from the basement of his new and rather odd neighbors, the Klopeks. Eventually, Ray, and his neighbors Art Weingartner and Vietnam veteran Mark Rumsfield gradually suspect the Klopeks may be ritualistic murderers. On another night, Ray, Art, and Rumsfield observe the youngest Klopek carting an over-sized garbage bag from the garage to the curbside garbage can, where he aggressively mashes it down with a hoe. Ray has also seen the Klopeks digging in their back yard during a rainstorm. The following morning, Ray, Rumsfield, and Art search the garbage truck for human remains after the Klopeks' trash can is collected, but find nothing. Rumsfield's wife, Bonnie, finds their neighbor Walter's dog running loose. Worried about the elderly man, Ray, Art, Mark, and Bonnie, along with Ricky Butler, a teen neighbor whose parents are away, go to Walter's house. Inside, they find overturned kitchen chairs and Walter's toupee, but no Walter. Ray collects the dog and leaves a note in case Walter returns. That night, Ray and Art theorize about Walter's mysterious disappearance, believing the Klopeks may have used him as a human sacrifice. When Ray's dog brings home what looks like a human femur bone, they are further convinced. Ray's wife, Carol, tired of her husband's and his buddies' behavior, organizes a welcome visit the Klopeks. Carol, Ray, Rumsfield, and Bonnie meet Hans, Reuben, and Werner Klopek. Meanwhile, Art snoops around the Klopek's backyard. After, Ray reveals to Art and Rumsfield that he found Walter's mail and his toupee at the Klopeks’, proving the Klopeks were inside Walter's house. The trio agree to search for Walter's body in the Klopeks' backyard while they are away the following day. Ray sends Carol and their son, Dave, to visit Carol's sister, freeing Ray and his buddies to explore the Klopeks' residence. Art and Ray dig for Walter's remains in the backyard, while Rumsfield stands guard. When nothing incriminating is found, Ray and Art break into the basement and discover what appears to be a crematorium. The Klopeks return home, accompanied by the police after having seen the lights on in their basement. Art goes to fetch Ray, who, digging into the basement's earthen floor, discovers what he believes is a buried crypt. He realizes too late his pick-ax has struck a gas line. Art escapes before the house explodes with Ray still inside. A disheveled and scorched Ray emerges from the flames just as Carol returns home. Walter arrives home during the commotion. He has been in the hospital and had asked the Klopeks to collect his mail while he was away. After Ray had earlier slipped Walter's toupee into the mail slot after absentmindedly putting it into his pocket, it was mistakenly gathered up with the mail. That is why it was in the Klopek's house. Ray declares he and the others were wrong about the Klopeks before climbing into the ambulance to go to the hospital. Werner Klopek enters the ambulance. Ray apologizes to him, but Werner accuses Ray of having seen the human skull in the basement furnace. He reveals they murdered the previous owners, confirming everyone's suspicions. Werner attempts to lethally inject Ray as Hans drives the ambulance away. As Ray and Werner struggle, the vehicle crashes into the Weingartners' house, ejecting both Werner and Ray, who then makes a citizen's arrest. Ricky uncovers human skeletal remains in the Klopeks' car trunk. The Klopeks are arrested and charges against Ray are dropped. Ray tells Ricky that he and his family are going away for awhile and tells him to watch over the neighborhood. 

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The most important plot line of the series is the unusual relationship between Ayato Kamina and Haruka Shitow. Although Haruka appears to be a stranger to Ayato at first, the series reveals that they knew each other from before the beginning of the story. Ayato is a boy who was unknowingly conceived with the help of the Bähbem Foundation living in Tokyo with his adoptive mother, Maya Kamina. Ayato had met Haruka on a trip outside of Tokyo, and they continued to see each other when they returned to school in Tokyo. At this time, Haruka's family name was Mishima. However, during what later became known as the Tokyo Jupiter incident, Haruka and her pregnant mother were away on a holiday trip while Ayato was caught inside the city. Years later, after giving birth to Haruka's sister Megumi, Haruka's mother remarried and their family name became Shitow. Meanwhile, Maya modified Ayato's memories to make him forget Haruka. The series makes clear that the entire population of Tokyo Jupiter is subject to the same kind of mental control, thinking that they are all that's left of mankind after a devastating war. Ayato is haunted by visions of Haruka, which he manifests in his art. Ixtli, RahXephon's soul, also adopts Haruka's appearance and family name (Mishima) to guide Ayato, but takes a different given name—Reika. The story begins as Tokyo comes under attack by invading aircraft while a mysterious woman, later revealed to be Haruka, stalks Ayato. By this point, Haruka has grown considerably older than Ayato and everyone else who is inside of Tokyo Jupiter because of the time dilation. Because of this and her now having a different last name, Ayato does not recognize Haruka and also initially does not fully trust her, but he gradually re-discovers his love for her as the series progresses, and he learns of everything that has happened. At the end of the series, Ayato's RahXephon merges with Quon's, allowing him to modify the past by "re-tuning the world" to make it so that he and Haruka are never separated. In the final sequence of the series, the adult Ayato is seen with his wife Haruka and their infant daughter Quon. 

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Windsor College seniors Maureen Evans and Phil Stevens attend a sneak preview of Stab, a film based on the events of the first film. During the movie, Phil uses the restroom and is killed by Ghostface. Ghostface enters to the screening and sits beside Maureen, who thinks it's Phil trying to scare her before finding blood on his cloak. Ghostface fatally stabs her, which the audience mistakes for a publicity stunt until Maureen falls dead in front of the movie screen. The following day, the news media, including local journalist Debbie Salt, descend on Windsor College where Sidney Prescott studies alongside her best friend Hallie McDaniel, her new boyfriend Derek Feldman, fellow Woodsboro survivor Randy Meeks and Derek's best friend Mickey Altieri. Two other Woodsboro survivors arrive at the campus: police officer Dewey Riley to help Sidney and reporter Gale Weathers to cover the case. Gale tries to stage a confrontation between Sidney and Cotton Weary, who is attempting to gain fame from his exoneration for the murder of Sidney's mother, Maureen Prescott. After Gale forcibly confronts Sidney with Cotton, Sidney angrily hits Gale. Later that evening, Sidney goes to a party with Hallie. At a sorority house, Ghostface murders student Cici Cooper. After all the partygoers leave, Ghostface crashes the party and attacks Sidney, though Derek intervenes. Ghostface injures Derek but flees when the police arrive. Later, after realizing that Cici's real name is Casey, Gale theorizes that the new Ghostface targets students having the same names as the Woodsboro murder victims. Gale, Dewey and Randy are talking on the campus lawn when Ghostface calls, hinting that he is watching them. Gale and Dewey decide to search for him while Randy keeps him talking. As Gale and Dewey are looking around the campus, Ghostface drags Randy into Gale's broadcast van and murders him. As night falls, Dewey and Gale review the tape of Ghostface killing Randy. The killer attacks them, stabbing Dewey while Gale escapes. Two officers drive Sidney and Hallie to a local police station, but Ghostface murders them. In the ensuing struggle, Ghostface is knocked unconscious, but soon revives and kills Hallie, prompting Sidney to flee. Back at the campus, Sidney finds Derek in the auditorium tied to a cross. Sidney begins to untie him when Ghostface arrives. The killer reveals himself to be Mickey and shoots Derek, killing him. Mickey tells Sidney that he intends to kill her and allow himself to be arrested so he can blame violence in movies for the murders at trial and be acquitted on the grounds of insanity, with the help of Alan Dershowitz or Johnnie Cochran as his defense attorney. He then introduces Debbie Salt as his accomplice, whom Sidney recognizes as Mrs. Loomis, the mother of Billy Loomis, who is seeking revenge against Sidney for killing her son. Mickey explains that Mrs. Loomis paid for Mickey's tuition fee in exchange for his killings. Mrs. Loomis then betrays Mickey and shoots him. Before Mickey collapses, he shoots Gale, causing her to fall off the stage. Sidney and Mrs. Loomis fight, until Cotton intervenes and Mrs. Loomis holds a knife to Sidney's throat. When Mrs. Loomis attempts to persuade Cotton to let her kill Sidney, Cotton shoots Mrs. Loomis in the chest. As they debate whether or not Mrs. Loomis is really dead, they find Gale still alive. Mickey suddenly resurfaces and attacks the group, to which Gale and Sidney respond by violently shooting him to death. Sidney turns to Mrs. Loomis and shoots her in the head to ensure she is dead. When the police arrive the next morning, Dewey is revealed to still be alive and Gale climbs into the ambulance with him rather than taking the opportunity to report to the cameras on the murders, showing that by the end of the movie she cared more for Dewey than for the notoriety she always sought. Sidney instructs the press to direct questions to Cotton, rewarding him with the fame he has been chasing while removing the attention from herself as she leaves the university campus. 

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Cotton Weary, now living in Los Angeles and the host of a successful talk television show, 100% Cotton, is contacted by Ghostface, who demands to know the whereabouts of Sidney Prescott. Cotton refuses to cooperate, and when Ghostface comes to his home, Cotton and his girlfriend Christine are murdered. Detective Mark Kincaid contacts Gale Weathers to discuss the murders, prompting her to travel to Hollywood, where she finds Dewey Riley working as an adviser on the set of Stab 3, the third film in the series based on the Ghostface murders. Using a voice changer as a ruse, Ghostface kills Stab 3 actress Sarah Darling. Sidney, now 22, is living in seclusion as a crisis counselor for an abused women's hotline, fearing that another killer may strike. Having discovered Sidney's location, the killer begins taunting her by phone, forcing her out of hiding and drawing her to Hollywood. As the remaining Stab 3 cast, along with Dewey and Gale, gather at the home of Jennifer Jolie, Ghostface murders her bodyguard and uses a gas leak to cause an explosion, killing fellow actor Tom Prinze in the process. Martha Meeks, the sister of Sidney's friend Randy, who was murdered while Sidney was in college, visits Sidney and the others to drop off a videotape that Randy had made before his death, posthumously warning them that the rules of a horror film do not apply to anyone in the third and final film of a horror trilogy, and that any of them, including main character Sidney, could die. Dewey, Gale, Jennifer, and the remaining Stab 3 cast, Angelina and Tyson, attend a birthday party for Stab 3's director Roman Bridger, where Ghostface strikes. Gale discovers Roman's dead body in the basement. Angelina wanders off alone before she is also murdered. Tyson attempts to fight Ghostface but the killer manages to throw him off a balcony to his death. Jennifer tries to escape through a secret passage, but Ghostface kills her as well. The killer then orders Sidney to the mansion to save Gale and Dewey, who are being held hostage. When she arrives, Ghostface forces Sidney to abandon her firearm and lures her inside where Gale and Dewey are bound and gagged with duct tape. As Sidney is untying them, Ghostface appears, though Sidney gains the upper hand using a second hidden gun to fight him off. Detective Kincaid shows up but is knocked unconscious by Ghostface. Sidney flees and hides in a secret screening room where she encounters Ghostface. He reveals himself as Roman, having faked his death and survived being shot due to a bulletproof vest. Roman admits to being Sidney's half-brother, born to their mother Maureen Prescott when she was an actress in Hollywood. Four years ago, he had unsuccessfully tried reuniting with her. Bitter over the rejection, Roman would film all the men she philandered with. He showed Billy Loomis the footage of his father with Maureen, which motivated him to kill her, thus setting off the string of murders in Sidney's hometown and at her college. However, when he discovered how much fame Sidney had attracted due to those events, Roman snapped and lured Sidney out of hiding. Roman then tells Sidney of his plan to frame her for the murders, before killing Stab producer John Milton. Sidney furiously tells Roman that he is responsible for all of the events that have occurred. A fight ensues between Sidney and Roman, which ends when Roman shoots Sidney in the chest. Sidney disappears, only to reappear and stab Roman in the back and chest. As he lies bleeding, Sidney shows him that she too was wearing a bulletproof vest. Dewey and Gale arrive when Roman suddenly resurfaces with a knife; unaware of his bulletproof vest, Dewey shoots him, but Sidney yells at him to shoot Roman in the head, which Dewey does, finally killing him. Some time after at Sidney's house, Dewey proposes to Gale, who accepts. Sidney returns from a walk with her dog and leaves her gates, which were previously shown to be alarmed, open. She enters her home and is invited to join Dewey, Gale, and Detective Kincaid to watch a movie. As she goes to join the others, her front door blows open behind her, but she walks away leaving it as is, finally confident that the murders are over. 

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The story is set at an upscale seaside resort in Florida. Muriel Glass, a wealthy and self-absorbed woman, phones her mother from her suite to discuss Muriel's husband Seymour, a World War II combat veteran recently discharged from an army hospital; it is implied that he was being evaluated for a psychiatric disorder.Slawenski, 2010, p. 160 Muriel's mother is concerned by reports of her son-in-law's increasingly bizarre and anti-social actions, and warns her daughter that he may "lose control of himself". Muriel dismisses her remarks as hyperbole, regarding her husband's idiosyncrasies as benign and manageable. Neither of the women express concern that Seymour's irrational behavior may indicate that he is suffering emotionally.Slawenski, 2010 Meanwhile, at the resort's adjoining beach, a child named Sybil Carpenter has been left unsupervised by her mother so that she may drink at the hotel bar. Sybil wanders on the beach and finds Seymour, lying in solitude a quarter-mile from the hotel. Sybil reproaches Seymour for allowing another little girl, Sharon Lipschutz, to sit with him the previous night as he played the lounge piano for the hotel's guests.Salinger, 1948, p. 14 Seymour attempts to placate Sybil by suggesting they "catch a Bananafish", but Sybil insists that Seymour choose between her and Sharon Lipschutz. Seymour responds that he observed Sybil abusing a hotel patron's dog, and the girl falls silent. Seymour places Sybil on a rubber raft and wades into the water, where he tells her the story of "the very tragic life" of the bananafish: they gorge themselves on bananas, become too large to escape their feeding holes, and die.Slawenski, 2010, p. 161 Sybil is unfazed by the story, and claims that she sees a bananafish with six bananas in its mouth. Seymour affectionately kisses the arch of one of her feet, and returns her to shore, where she departs. Once alone, and returning to the hotel, Seymour becomes less affable. He starts a baseless argument with a woman in an elevator, accusing her of staring at his feet and calling her a "god-damned sneak". He returns to his hotel room, where his wife is taking a nap. He retrieves a pistol from his luggage and shoots himself. 

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Unlike the previous games where the storyline is rather comical, ~n has a serious storyline, reminiscent of those in the Madou Monogatari games. The Dark Prince is found looking at some books in a magical library when he comes across a black box. He begins to examine the black box before it breaks free from his hands and opens. The next morning a Puyo Circus has arrived, and Arle alongside Carbuncle go to check it out. They are greeted by a mysterious figure in Pierrot, a jester-looking character. When Arle arrives, something does not appear right, and Carbuncle disappears once more. Arle has to navigate her way past a number of foes as before. During her quest Draco, Seriri, Witch and Chico join up with Arle as they face Schezo and Rulue. Rulue knew something was up with the Dark Prince, and as Arle met him, he appeared strange and unlike his normal self. He freezes the other characters so that they do not interfere. Arle beats the Dark Prince, who wakes up and asks why Arle was there. The Dark Prince explains to Arle that he was brainwashed by a stronger foe, and Pierrot appears afterwards, revealing herself to be Doppelganger Arle. The two have a fight to see who exists in the world, and Arle was victorious. After the fight, Doppelganger Arle insists that she is "The Real Arle" who existed in the world, feeling weakened by her defeat, she soon fades away, much to Arle's shock. Seconds later, Carbuncle reappeared in the room and Arle was thrilled to see him again. The gem on Carbuncle's forehead shines and Arle asks what was wrong, he discharges the beam from his forehead and the screen fades to white then black, and the credits roll. 

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The film opens with a scene that is repeated later in the film in which a reporter meets with police searching a cavern. He is told a game of Mazes and Monsters got out of hand. Robbie Wheeling (Tom Hanks) starts college at the fictional Grant University and soon develops a group of friends, all of whom have their own personal problems and issues. Jay Jay (Chris Makepeace) feels marginalized by his mother, who constantly redecorates his room since she can't make up her mind about the best look. In his "self-decorating", he wears a variety of unusual hats. Kate (Wendy Crewson) has had a series of failed relationships, and suffers from her father leaving home; Daniel's (David Wallace) parents reject his dream of becoming a video-game designer; and Robbie's alcoholic mother and strict father fight constantly, and he is still tormented by the mysterious disappearance of his brother, Hall. They are fans of Mazes and Monsters, a fantasy role-playing game that had previously caused Robbie to get kicked out of his last school when he became too obsessed with it. Though he is reluctant, the other three students convince him to start playing again with them. Through the course of playing the game, Robbie and Kate begin a serious relationship, in which he confides in her that he still has nightmares about his missing brother. Eventually, Jay Jay, upset by feeling left out by his friends, decides to commit suicide in a local cavern. In the process of planning it out, he changes his mind and decides the cavern would be better suited to a new Mazes and Monsters campaign. He dramatically kills off his character to force them to start a new campaign, in which he describes they will be living out their fantasy. He proposes playing his new game in a disused and condemned cavern, and dismisses the warnings from his friends – who reluctantly agree to participate. During the actual spelunking, Robbie experiences a psychotic episode involving the last time he saw his brother, and he hallucinates that he has slain a monster, called a Gorvil. From this point forward, Robbie believes he is actually his character, the cleric Pardieu. This leads him to break off his relationship with Kate (to maintain celibacy), and to start drawing maps that will lead him to a sacred place he has seen in his dreams called the Great Hall. In his dream, the Great Hall tells him to go to the Two Towers, and he disappears. His friends report him to the police while concealing their trip into the caverns. They and police investigators suspect he is deceased. Robbie travels to New York City, where he stabs a mugger whom he imagines to be a monster. He sees blood on his knife, then sees his bloodied clothes in a window and breaks out of his delusions for long enough to call Kate from a payphone. After he agrees to go to Jay Jay's house, a delusion leads him into the subway. Not finding him at Jay Jay's house, the friends deduce Robbie has equated the Two Towers with the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center. Robbie believes that by jumping off one of them and casting a spell, he will finally join the Great Hall. After a search, his friends find him and stop him from jumping off the south tower observation deck using the game's rules, once again pulling him out of his delusion. The film ends with the friends visiting Robbie at his parents' estate, hoping to pick up their friendship where they left off. Though he is now in regular counseling, it is implied that Robbie will live out the rest of his life trapped in his imaginary world believing that he is still Pardieu, that his friends are really their characters, and that he is living at an inn (actually his parents' home) and paying for his boarding with a magic coin, which "magically" reappears in his pouch each morning. He then tells his shocked friends of a great evil lurking in the forest across the lake, believing that it threatens the lives of the "innkeeper" and his wife. The three, feeling sorry for Robbie and guilty for their role in his psychotic break, decide to engage him in a "game" of Mazes and Monsters, letting Robbie dictate the events to them. In the end, Kate says, "And so ... we played the game again ... for one last time." 

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Kate Hartounian (Jessica Lundy) is the daughter of a wealthy and widowed real estate developer of Armenian and Jewish descent. Eager to improve her lot in life, she makes friends with Miffy Young (Chynna Phillips), a snooty WASP girl, who encourages her and her father to join their country club. Kate and her father, Jack (Jackie Mason), apply for membership at Bushwood, the club from the first movie. Jack is a self-made millionaire, yet remains self-effacing, friendly and generous despite his wealth. His crude personality and eccentric clothing foils him on many occasions. When the current members meet Jack, who builds low-income housing in more upscale neighborhoods, his application to join is rejected. The rejection stems from his oafish personality and an earlier confrontation with Bushwood President (and Miffy's father) Chandler Young's (Robert Stack) wife. The glamorous Cynthia Young (Dina Merrill) had tried unsuccessfully to persuade Jack to build his housing complex away from her neighborhood, but her less-than-subtle snobbery leads Jack to chase Cynthia with a bulldozer. It's actions like these that build a divide between Jack and Kate. Ty Webb (Chevy Chase) returns, this time as the club's majority owner, and while he admires Jack, he prefers to stay out of the way of the club's day-to-day operations. The elitist members of Bushwood reject Jack's membership application and pull strings to suspend his housing operation. In retaliation, Jack buys Bushwood's stock from Ty and turns it into an amusement park. Chandler, incensed at the thought of a mere "nouveau-riche" individual getting the better of him, hires Captain Tom Everett (Dan Aykroyd) (who code-names Chandler "Mrs. Esterhaus"), a shell- shocked mercenary operating out of a lunch wagon, to "discourage" Jack from building any more structures on Bushwood property. The bumbling Everett decides to use explosive golf balls to do this. Meanwhile, Chandler uses his lawyers and connections to shut down Jack's housing construction site. Webb suggests that the dispute should be resolved like gentlemen, by facing each other in a golf match. If Chandler wins, Jack loses his construction site and the country club, and if Jack wins, he keeps Bushwood and the housing project. Despite Jack's poor performance early in the match, with luck he ties the match before the final hole. However, during the hole, Jack is faced with a 50-foot putt, while Chandler faces a simple two-foot putt. Using advice given to him by Webb before the match, Jack manages to use spiritual chanting and the adage "be the ball" to sink the nearly impossible putt. Chandler needs to sink the easy two-foot putt to tie the match. Meanwhile, Everett, who foolishly shoots himself in the buttocks with a poison dart, fails to eliminate Jack as a gopher steals his explosive ball. The mischievous gopher replaces Chandler's ball with the explosive ball, and as his family encouragingly crowds around him as he taps in his final swing, the ball bursts and Jack wins the match. Though Kate is embarrassed by her father's actions, she is still loyal to him, as evidenced when she commiserates to Miffy, who suggests that she change her last name from Hartounian to Hart. Bewildered at the thought of turning her back on her family name, Kate turns her back on Miffy and makes up with her father. 

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In 1950, a Hungarian couple, Peter and Margit, are forced to flee from the oppressive Hungarian People's Republic for the United States, taking along their eldest daughter Maria. Unfortunately, they are forced to leave behind their infant daughter, Suzanne, who is raised by a kind foster couple. Five years later, Peter and Margit arrange for the American Red Cross to bring Suzanne to their new home in Los Angeles. There, the perplexed young girl is forced to accept her sudden change in home and country, which leads to a troubled upbringing. At age 15, Suzanne, rebellious and unsure of herself, tries to come to terms with her roots and decides to travel back to Budapest, Hungary, to unravel her past and to find her true identity. 

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The story follows Arkady Renko, a chief investigator for the Moscow militsiya, who is assigned to a case involving three corpses found in Gorky Park, an amusement park in Moscow. The victims - two men and a woman - were shot, and have had their faces and fingertips cut off by the murderer to prevent identification. Ice skates found on the woman's body lead Arkady to Irina Asanova, a wardrobe girl at a movie studio, who claims that she reported them stolen, and has no idea how they ended up with the victims. However, Arkady tentatively identifies the three bodies as known associates of Irina: her friend Valerya Davidova, Valerya's boyfriend Kostia Borodin, and an American expatriate student named James Kirwill. Arkady gives the woman's skull to Professor Andreev, an anthropologist at Moscow University, who specializes in reconstructing whole faces from bone structure. At a bathhouse, Arkady's superior, Chief Prosecutor Iamskoy, introduces Arkady to an American fur millionaire, John Osborne, who regularly visits Russia. When Arkady begins to suspect a connection between Osborne and the murders, he is warned by his associate, Mendel, a junior official in the Soviet Trade Ministry, that Osborne is an informant for the KGB, and thus regarded as a "friend" by all of Arkady's superiors. Arkady's problems escalate when his partner is shot to death investigating Davidova's apartment, and Kirwill's elder brother William, a detective with the New York City Police Department who speaks fluent Russian, arrives in Moscow intending to find and kill his brother's murderer. Arkady tries to discover as much as he can from Kirwill to confirm the corpse's identity, without admitting that he suspects Osborne. When Irina is attacked on the Moscow underground, Arkady hides her in his own apartment, vacant since his wife, Zoya, left him for one of her colleagues at the school where she teaches. Arkady reluctantly pays a visit to his father, retired Red Army General Renko, a.k.a. "Stalin's Favorite General", a.k.a. "The Butcher of Ukraine". The elder Renko remembers that Osborne was an O.S.S. officer attached to the Red Army during the Nazi invasion, tasked with interrogating three captured S.S. officers. Thanks to his charm and fluent German, Osborne got the information he needed from the officers over a friendly picnic in the countryside, then shot all three of them dead - almost exactly the manner in which the three bodies in Gorky Park were killed. Arkady and Irina become lovers after admitting their mutual attraction, but Arkady is convinced that she knows about Osborne's connection with the three victims, except she believes that Osborne has helped Valerya and Kostia to defect to America, with their friend Kirwill, a radical anti- Soviet, hoping to claim a publicity victory for having facilitated their escape. To convince Irina that Valerya is dead, Arkady sets up a situation in which he is going to show her Professor Andreev's reconstruction, even though by this point the reconstruction has been destroyed by Renko's higher-ups. The ruse works, and she admits that her friend is dead rather than have to look at the reconstructed head. Despite being born into the nomenklatura himself, Arkady exposes corruption and dishonesty on the part of influential and well- protected members of the elite, regardless of the consequences. This rebounds on him when his own superior, Iamskoy, and his best friend, a lawyer named Misha, are both revealed to be working with Osborne. Arkady flees a meeting with Misha before a gang of killers arrive, but is too late to prevent Iamskoy from appropriating the reconstructed head and destroying it. Arkady confronts Osborne at gunpoint as he is about to leave the country, but Osborne informs him that Iamskoy has already kidnapped Irina, and if Arkady lets Osborne go and rushes to the university campus, he might be just in time to save her. Arkady does so, killing Iamskoy and Osborne's chief henchman, but suffering a near fatal stomach wound. He recuperates in the custody of the State, being regularly interrogated by the KGB and watched over by his old antagonist, KGB Major Pribluda. In spite of his weakened state, Arkady laughs when he realizes from his interrogators' questions that Iamskoy was himself a high-ranking KGB officer, planted as a spy in the militsiya, and his superiors were badly embarrassed to find that he betrayed them to help Osborne. Months later, Arkady is brought before a KGB General who confirms what Arkady already suspected: that Kostia Borodin (an expert hunter) and Valerya helped Osborne to trap and smuggle live sables - the only high-quality fur-bearing animal on which the Soviet Union enjoys a monopoly - out of Russia. They believed Osborne would help them defect in exchange, but instead he killed them. Now, after several months of negotiations, Osborne has agreed to return the sables in exchange for Arkady being released and brought to America. Arkady's brief trip to New York City reunites him with Osborne, Irina, and Kirwill in succession. Arkady is outraged when Osborne tells him that he and Irina are lovers, but Irina swears that she only slept with Osborne twice - once to convince him to help her defect, and once more to convince him to bring Arkady to America. FBI agents escort Arkady and Irina to Osborne's ranch on Staten Island where the exchange is supposed to take place. During the trip Arkady realizes that, to avoid a diplomatic incident, the FBI agents plan to let Osborne kill him and Irina before allowing KGB agents, who are tailing them, to kill Osborne. When they arrive at the ranch the group finds Kirwill, shot and disemboweled. He finally identified Osborne as his brother's killer, but was overcome by Osborne's attack dogs when he came to confront him. Osborne appears, armed with a hunting rifle, and Arkady convinces him that the FBI is planning a betrayal. Osborne shoots two of the FBI agents as two KGB agents arrive, and the KGB and FBI agents are killed in the chaotic firefight that ensues. Osborne finally corners and wounds Arkady in the sable pens. Arkady gains the upper hand by releasing several of the sables, causing Osborne to rush recklessly into the pen where Arkady is able to shoot and kill him. Irina arrives and says that she wants to stay in America, but Arkady, finding America to be as corrupt as the Soviet Union, chooses to return to the latter; he also knows that if he does return home, the Soviet authorities will be less inclined to demand Irina's return. Realizing that the only way to reduce his superiors' ire is to kill all the illicit sables, Arkady picks up Osborne's hunting rifle, but instead he decides to break open their cages and release them into the forest. 

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While visiting a health studio in Beverly Hills, fashion model Jennifer Downing, the daughter of millionaire P.J. Downing, is kidnapped. Her father turns to a family friend, Eliot Draisen, who is president of the detective agency Crumb & Crumb, to investigate the case. Eliot is reluctant to supply P.J. with one of his capable detectives because, as it turns out, Eliot himself is the organizer of the kidnapping. To give the appearance of taking the investigation seriously, Eliot offers P.J. the services of Harry Crumb, the last descendant of the agency's founders. Eliot knows that Harry is incompetent and counts on this fact to get away with the crime. Harry returns to Los Angeles (by bus) from an assignment in the firm's Tulsa, Oklahoma branch office (which he messed up, as usual). He is assisted in his investigation by P.J.'s younger daughter, Nikki, who is considerably smarter than he is. Harry deduces that Nikki's stepmother, Helen Downing, is having an affair with tennis coach Vince Barnes, and concludes she is behind the kidnapping. Helen is desired by Eliot, but all she is interested in is money. She tries to get rid of her husband on several occasions and does her best - along with Barnes - to get the ransom for herself. Also assigned to the case is Police Detective Casey, who (unlike Harry) is competent and experienced in kidnapping cases, and has a strongly negative opinion of private eyes. Eliot escapes to the airport, bound for Buenos Aires. He makes the mistake of informing Helen of his plans; she and Barnes take the money and leave him bound and gagged. Harry arrives to confront Helen and Barnes just as their plane prepares to take off. Jennifer is freed and Eliot is found. Falsely believing Harry has deduced his part in the kidnapping and exasperated with Harry's dumb luck, Eliot confesses and is taken into police custody. Harry is thanked for his heroism in the case and even Det. Casey applauds Harry for solving the case. In the end, Harry takes over as the new president of his family's business, and promptly accepts a new assignment to investigate another case, this time a murder committed in a gay bar. 

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;Act I It is Spring, and Drake thinks about life on the farm. ("A Poultry Tale"). As he attempts to sneak away, Ida scolds him for neglecting their eggs that are about to hatch. Drake believes one huge egg is a turkey's egg, but Ida is doubtful. Ida expresses "The Joy of Motherhood" and is joined by her friend Maureen, when all of the "normal" eggs hatch. Drake takes the ducklings to learn to swim, leaving Ida to wait for the fifth egg to hatch ("Different" pre-reprise). It finally hatches to reveal Ugly. Ida is initially shocked but is overjoyed that the new arrival is not a turkey. As she teaches him to swim, she notices his amazing talent ("Hold Your Head Up High"). When Drake and the ducklings return, they are aghast at Ugly's appearance and, along with Maureen, Henrietta, the Turkey, and everyone else, make fun of him, while the Cat admires what a great meal he would be ("Look At Him"). As Ugly tries and fails to "quack," he realises he isn't the same as the others ("Different"). The Cat offers to be Ugly's friend and to treat him to lunch, which he happily accepts. Ugly tries to get Ida's permission, but she is too busy with the other ducklings. After Ugly leaves with the Cat, Ida realises Ugly is missing. Everyone splits up to look for him. In his lair, the Cat is preparing to eat Ugly, who is unaware of the danger ("Play with Your Food"). Just as the Cat is about to strike, the children playing outside send a ball flying through the window, hitting the Cat and causing him to fall into the pot. Ugly thinks he is hiding and goes to find a hiding place of his own, but ends up getting "Lost". Back at the duckyard, no one can find Ugly, and they mourn him ("The Elegy"), but Ida refuses to believe he is dead. Jay Bird (or Maggie Pie), interrupts and begins to interview Ida for "Britain's Most Feathered". Ida laments about what it's like to lose one of your children ("Every Tear a Mother Cries"). Ida continues to search for Ugly, leaving her other four ducklings with Drake. Meanwhile, Ugly comes across two military geese, Greylag and Dot, and begs for their help. They and their "squadron" of geese decide to go on a reconnaissance mission to find Ugly's home ("Wild Goose Chase"). However, there is a shoot going on in the marsh, so the Cat sneaks in and offers to help out by telling them when the shoot is over, hoping that they will leave him alone with Ugly. Greylag sees through the Cat's plan and takes him along. The Geese and the Cat head off to the shoot, which is still going on, and get shot down. Ugly, who didn't go on the mission with them, realises that the Cat is evil and had lied. Ida sets off to find Ugly, and they both vow to find each other and be reunited. ("Hold Your Head Up High" Reprise). ;Act II Ugly wanders into a house and meets Queenie and Lowbutt, a domesticated cat and chicken. They too make fun of him not only for his looks but also for not being of "their sort" ("It Takes All Sorts"). When they turn on the TV, they see Ida and Jay Bird broadcasting a missing notice for Ugly. Ugly recognises his mother and Queenie goes to call the advertised number. Just then the doorbell rings, and the Cat enters, poorly disguised as Drake. Ugly sees through the disguise, but Lowbutt believes he is actually Ugly's father. But when Queenie comes back in, the Cat falls in love. Queenie also thinks he is a duck, but she too falls in love when he removes his disguise ("Together"). Lowbutt is dismayed, so she helps Ugly to escape, leaving the Cat to decide between his meal and Queenie. He chooses to go after Ugly, leaving Lowbutt to console Queenie. Back at the farmyard, Drake is forced into some responsibility, and, now that the ducklings are almost a year old, they are beginning to give Drake a hard time as teenagers. Ida, still searching for Ugly, comes across everyone that Ugly has met ("The Collage"). Meanwhile, Ugly finds Penny, a swan, caught in some fishing line and untangles her. Penny, knowing Ugly is a swan, invites him to migrate with her, but Ugly insists that he can't. As Penny flies away, Ugly realises he is in love with her ("Now I've Seen You"), but is sad because he believes she could never love someone as ugly as himself. Just then, a Bullfrog comes hopping by. Noticing his bad mood, he tells Ugly about how "ugliness" is just a matter of taste and that someone out there will always love you "Warts and All". The song cheers Ugly up, and the bullfrog leaves. Suddenly, a net drops on Ugly's head. A farmer has caught him for his family's Sunday roast. When the Farmer goes to get his knife, the Cat sneaks back onstage and offers a deal; he will lead Ugly back to the farm, but Ugly has to promise to be the Cat's lunch. Ugly agrees, and both of them head back to the farmyard. On the way, the two get caught in a blizzard and freeze ("The Blizzard"). Ida unfortunately has gotten caught in it as well. Ida notices them and believes Ugly is dead. Penny and her family come to Ida and tell her to cry, that her tears of hope will save Ugly. Soon Ugly wakes up and realises he is not a duck, but a swan, then reunites with his mother ("Transformation"). Penny recognises that Ugly is the one who saved her earlier and the two confess their love to each other. The swans invite Ugly to come learn their ways. Although Ugly wants to stay with Ida, she insists that he go with the swans. As they fly off, Ida sings of how Ugly was different, but Ugly suddenly reappears with Penny, as they have decided to stay with Ida. Just before they leave, Ugly frees the Cat, who has remained frozen this entire time. As the Cat notices Ugly is not a duck but a swan, he goes insane before running away in defeat ("Melting Moggy"). Ugly, Penny and Ida return to the lake; everyone loves Ugly now that he is a swan. They ask for his forgiveness for making fun of him ("Look At Him" Reprise). Ugly happily accepts their apology and introduces Penny. Grace decides to relinquish the Red Band, now the Cygnet Ring, to Ugly, dubbing him "the finest bird on the lake". 

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In a technologically-advanced 1939, the zeppelin Hindenburg III moors itself atop the Empire State Building. Aboard the airship is Dr. Jorge Vargas, a scientist who arranges for a package containing two vials to be delivered to Dr. Walter Jennings. The courier looks back while leaving with the vials, to see that Dr. Vargas has vanished. Polly Perkins, a reporter for The Chronicle, is looking into the disappearances of Vargas and five other renowned scientists. A cryptic message leads her to Radio City Music Hall, against the warnings of her editor, Mr. Paley, where she meets Dr. Jennings during a showing of The Wizard of Oz. He tells her that a Dr. Totenkopf is coming for him next. Suddenly, seemingly indestructible robots attack the city. Clearly outmatched, the authorities call for "Sky Captain" Joe Sullivan, the city's hero, Perkins' former lover, and the commander of the private air force the Flying Legion. While Joe engages the robots with his modified Curtiss P-40 pursuit fighter, Perkins photographs from the street with little regard for her safety. He eventually manages to disable one robot; the rest leave thereafter. News reports show similar attacks around the globe. The disabled robot is taken back to the Legion's air base so that technology expert Dex can examine it. Polly follows and convinces Joe to reluctantly let her in on the investigation. Her information takes them to the ransacked laboratory of a dying Dr. Jennings, while an assassin escapes. Just before he dies, Jennings gives Polly the two vials and states that they are crucial to Totenkopf's plans. Polly hides the vials and withholds the information from Joe. They return to the Legion's base just before it comes under attack from squadrons of ornithopter drones. Dex tracks the origin of the signal controlling the drones and notes it on a map before his capture. Joe and Polly find Dex's map and fly to Nepal and then Tibet, where they discover an abandoned mining outpost and meet Joe's old friend Kaji. Two guides working for Totenkopf force Polly to turn over the vials, locking the duo in a room full of dynamite. Joe and Polly manage to escape just before the room explodes, knocking them unconscious and destroying most of Polly's film. They wake up together in the mythical Shangri-La. The Tibetan-speaking monks there tell of Totenkopf's enslavement of their people, forcing them to work in the uranium mines. Most were killed by the radiation, but the final survivor provides a clue to where Dr. Totenkopf is hiding. With insufficient fuel to make it there, they run into a Royal Navy flying aircraft carrier commanded by another of Joe's former flames, Commander Franky Cook. Franky leads the attack on Totenkopf's island lair while Joe and Polly enter through an underwater inlet. Joe and Polly find themselves on an island with dinosaur-like creatures, which Polly hesitates to photograph as she has only two shots left. They find a secret subterranean facility in a mountain, where robots are loading animals, as well as the mysterious vials, onto a large "Noah's Ark" rocket. Joe and Polly are detected but Dex, piloting a flying barge, arrives with three of the missing scientists. One of whom explains that Totenkopf has given up on humanity and seeks to start the world over again: the "World of Tomorrow". The vials are genetic material for a new Adam and Eve. Sky Captain says they should just let Totenkopf go but Dex states that they can't; if the rocket reaches space, the afterburners will ignite the atmosphere and kill everyone on Earth. As the group attempts to enter Dr. Totenkopf's lair, one scientist is electrocuted by the defense system. A hologram of Totenkopf appears, speaking of his hate for humanity and his plans to rebuild it as a new master race. Dex disables the lair's defenses and the group discovers Totenkopf's mummified corpse inside with a scrap of paper clutched in his hand: "forgive me". He had died 20 years prior, but his machines continued his plan. Joe decides to sabotage the rocket from the inside while the others escape. Polly tries to tag along but Joe kisses her and then knocks her out. Polly recovers, following Joe and saving him from Dr. Jennings' assassin, a female robot. Joe and Polly then board the rocket. Before the rocket reaches 100 km, when its second stage is scheduled to fire and thereby incinerate the Earth, Polly pushes an emergency button that ejects all the animals in escape pods. Joe tries to disable the rocket only to be interrupted by the same assassin robot. He jolts the robot with its electric weapon and then uses it on the controls, disabling the rocket. Joe and Polly use the last pod to save themselves as the rocket explodes. Joe and Polly watch the animal pods splash down around their escape pod, while Commander Cook leads a group of flying aircraft carriers towards them. Polly then uses the last shot on her camera to take a picture of Joe rather than the animal pods. Joe grins and says: "Polly--lens cap." 

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Ash and Pikachu are on vacation (presumably after having competed in the Orange League) when they are called on the phone by Professor Oak, who tells Ash he has been selected as one of the challengers for the official Puzzle League Tournament. Excited, he races off with Pikachu to the nearby Pokémon Puzzle League Village. To succeed in the tournament, Ash challenges Gary, his first rival, eventually defeating all eight of the Kanto region rivals and earning their badges after being obstructed in his path by Tracey, Team Rocket, and Giovanni, all of whom he also defeats. Soon after, he defeats the Elite Four and comes face-to-face with the Puzzle Champion, who is none other than Gary. Upon defeating Gary once again, Ash is rewarded with a trophy, which immediately warps him to another dimension where he is welcomed into a last challenge by Mewtwo. After defeating Mewtwo, Ash is warped back to his vacation spot where he discovers a Pokémon Puzzle Master trophy awarded to him by Mewtwo. 

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The beautiful young Theodora Fitzgerald belongs to a family of noble lineage whose fortunes have waned and who have lived in near poverty for most of her life. The book begins with her arranged marriage to Josiah Brown, a nouveau- riche Australian in his fifties. The marriage was contracted for convenience: Josiah simply wants a pretty and aristocratic wife to improve his standing in society, and the Fitzgerald family are in need of Brown's financial resources. Theodora only agrees to the marriage for the sake of her father and sisters. Immediately after the wedding, Josiah falls ill. Theodora proves a dutiful and capable wife, and attends to her husband's every need, though she is secretly very unhappy. After a year of marriage, Josiah is well enough to visit Paris, where Theodora sees her father, Dominic, again for the first time since her wedding. She is thrilled to observe that at least he is receiving all the benefits she'd hoped to bring from her sacrifice: he now runs in aristocratic circles and is courting a wealthy American widow, Mrs. McBride. Theodora attends several social outings with her father, and at one dinner is introduced to Hector, Lord Bracondale. Theodora and Hector hit things off splendidly, and soon fall in love. Mrs. McBride is aware of Theodora's unhappy marriage, and seeing the situation she sympathetically arranges for Hector and Theodora to spend time together as often as possible. One day while Theodora and Hector are being chauffeured back to Paris after an outing at Versailles, the two indulge in a romantic encounter in the back of the car. Full of guilt thereafter, the two conclude they must behave themselves from now on and must no longer pursue each other romantically; they will, however, continue to be friendly to one another any time future social obligations might cause them to meet. Hector at this point is terribly in love with Theodora, and though he tries his best to live by his promise to her, he still goes out of his way to see her and to secure invitations to all the same gatherings that she attends. He fantasizes about marrying her and makes sure to introduce her to his mother and to his sister. However, Theodora's status as a newcomer into society, and the obvious favour that Hector pays her over other eligible women who desire his hand, causes ire and jealousy to be directed her way. Rumors begin to spread, and several people believe Hector and Theodora to be lovers. Morella Winmarleigh, a spurned candidate for Hector's hand, particularly sets out destroy Theodora. She maliciously switches a letter Theodora had written to Hector with another letter meant for Josiah. Meanwhile, without anyone else's knowledge, Theodora and Hector have concluded that they cannot attempt to remain friends any longer—their love is too strong—and so they must agree to never see each other again. The next day, Josiah receives Theodora's letter meant for Hector: the contents amount to Theodora asking Hector never to see her again, even though the two of them could be very happy together, because it is her duty to instead attend to the happiness of her husband Josiah. Josiah realises for the first time how he has stood in the way of Theodora's happiness, and resolves to do his best to make her happy from now on. He forwards the letter to Hector and requests he never allow Theodora to learn of the mix-up. The next several months pass with Theodora and Josiah both trying their best to make the other happy, even while both are secretly miserable. Both begin to suffer from ill health. Ultimately, Josiah dies; eighteen months later, Mrs. McBride (now married to Dominic Fitzgerald) throws a picnic at Versailles to which both Theodora and Hector are invited. The book ends with the couple reunited, in a state of "passionate love and delirious happiness." 

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Jack (Ray Liotta) awakes with amnesia in the middle of the desert. Suffering from violent flashbacks, he finds his way to the home of reclusive artist Vicky Robinson (Gloria Reuben), who agrees to help him uncover his past. While Jack's flashbacks become more violent and vivid, the pieces of his past slowly come together. He remembers having a large sum of money, which is now missing. As his apparent associates catch up with him demanding to know the whereabouts of the stash, Jack realizes that they are not only after the money, but his life. 

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Isabel Archer, from Albany, New York, is invited by her maternal aunt, Lydia Touchett, to visit Lydia's rich husband, Daniel, at his estate near London, following the death of Isabel's father. There, Isabel meets her uncle, her friendly invalid cousin Ralph Touchett, and the Touchetts' robust neighbor, Lord Warburton. Isabel later declines Warburton's sudden proposal of marriage. She also rejects the hand of Caspar Goodwood, the charismatic son and heir of a wealthy Boston mill owner. Although Isabel is drawn to Caspar, her commitment to her independence precludes such a marriage, which she feels would demand the sacrifice of her freedom. The elder Touchett grows ill and, at the request of his son, Ralph, leaves much of his estate to Isabel upon his death. With her large legacy, Isabel travels the Continent and meets an American expatriate, Gilbert Osmond, in Florence. Although Isabel had previously rejected both Warburton and Goodwood, she accepts Osmond's proposal of marriage, unaware that it has been actively promoted by the accomplished but untrustworthy Madame Merle, another American expatriate, whom Isabel had met at the Touchetts' estate. Isabel and Osmond settle in Rome, but their marriage rapidly sours due to Osmond's overwhelming egotism and lack of genuine affection for his wife. Isabel grows fond of Pansy, Osmond's presumed daughter by his first marriage, and wants to grant her wish to marry Edward Rosier, a young art collector. The snobbish Osmond would prefer that Pansy accept the proposal of Warburton, who had previously proposed to Isabel. Isabel suspects, however, that Warburton may just be feigning interest in Pansy to get close to Isabel again, and the conflict creates even more strain within the unhappy marriage. Isabel then learns that Ralph is dying at his estate in England and prepares to go to him for his final hours, but Osmond selfishly opposes this plan. Meanwhile, Isabel learns from her sister-in-law that Pansy is actually the daughter of Madame Merle, who had had an adulterous relationship with Osmond for several years. Isabel pays a final visit to Pansy, who desperately begs her to return someday, which Isabel reluctantly promises to do. She then leaves, without telling her spiteful husband, to comfort the dying Ralph in England, where she remains until his death. Goodwood encounters her at Ralph's estate and begs her to leave Osmond and come away with him. He passionately embraces and kisses her, but Isabel flees. Goodwood seeks her out the next day but is told she has set off again for Rome. The ending is ambiguous, and the reader is left to imagine whether Isabel returned to Osmond to suffer out her marriage in noble tragedy (perhaps for Pansy's sake), or she is going to rescue Pansy and leave Osmond. 

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In 1981 Afghanistan, a Soviet tank unit viciously attacks a Pashtun village harboring a group of mujahideen fighters. Following the assault, one of the tanks—commanded by ruthless commander Daskal (George Dzundza)—takes a wrong turn through a mountain pass and enters a blind valley. Taj (Steven Bauer) returns to discover the village destroyed, his father killed, and his brother martyred by being crushed under Daskal's tank. As the new khan following his brother's death, Taj is spurred to seek revenge by his cousin Moustafa, an opportunistic scavenger. Together they lead a band of mujahideen fighters into the valley to pursue Daskal's tank (which they call "The Beast"), counting on their captured RPG-7 anti-tank weapon to destroy it. Lost, isolated, and with their radio damaged in the village attack, the tank crew set out to find Kandahar Road and return to Soviet lines. While camping for the night, Afghan communist crewman Samad (Erick Avari) educates the reluctant tank driver, Konstantin Koverchenko (Jason Patric), about the Pashtun people's code of honour, Pashtunwali; particularly nanawatai, which requires that an enemy is to be given sanctuary if he asks. En route, the crew suffer several setbacks and ambushes from Taj's band. Suspecting Samad to be a traitor, Daskal murders him in front of his men; Koverchenko threatens to report Daskal for the illegal killing. At a brief stop, Koverchenko reports that their tank is breaking down; Daskal accuses him of mutiny and orders gunner Kaminski (Don Harvey) and driver Golikov (Stephen Baldwin) to tie him to a rock, and leave him with a grenade behind his head as a booby-trap for the mujahideen. Wild dogs eventually attack Koverchenko, but he is saved when the grenade rolls off the rock and explodes, scaring them off. Taj's band reunite with several vengeful women from the village and find Koverchenko, who pleads for nanawatai. The mujahideen give him food and shelter. Koverchenko befriends Taj after fixing the band's broken RPG-7, and agrees to help him destroy the tank. The remaining tank crew realize they are trapped in the valley, until a Soviet helicopter (searching for water) appears and offers to rescue them. Caring more for his tank than his men, Daskal refuses the offer, has the vehicle's gasoline refilled, and the crew heads back towards the narrow mountain pass from which they came, which the helicopter pilot says is the only way out. They drive through the night, and eventually return to a water hole they had poisoned earlier with cyanide to try and kill Taj's band; there they find the helicopter crew dead, having drunk from the same pool. The mujahideen and Koverchenko catch up with the tank, and pursue it through the mountain pass. Koverchenko finally fires the RPG after a tense chase, only to damage the tank's main gun. Just as it seems the tank will escape, the village women (armed with explosives) blow up the cliff-side, dropping boulders onto the tank and disabling it. Koverchenko sets fire to the tank's leaked gasoline, forcing the crew to bail; he pleads nanawatai on their behalf, and Taj reluctantly agrees. Koverchenko confronts Daskal over his brutality, and desires that he live to see the Soviets lose the war. Kaminski and Golikov flee on foot, but Daskal is chased down by the village women and murdered; they bring back his bloodied uniform to Taj as trophies. Horrified, Koverchenko waves down an arriving Soviet helicopter to be rescued. Taj stops Moustafa from shooting Koverchenko, who salutes Taj as he is hoisted by a harness, brandishing a jezail musket Taj had just gifted to him. The film ends with Koverchenko flying off with the helicopter over the Afghan landscape. 

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In 1949, young Jim Morrison and his family are traveling on a desert highway where they encounter an auto wreck and see an elderly Native American dying by the roadside. In 1965, Jim arrives in California and is assimilated into the Venice Beach culture. During his tenure studying at UCLA, he meets his future girlfriend Pamela Courson. He also meets Ray Manzarek for the first time, as well as Robby Krieger and John Densmore, all of whom form The Doors with Morrison. Jim convinces his bandmates to travel to Death Valley and experience the effects of psychedelic drugs. Returning to Los Angeles, they play several shows at the famous Whisky a Go Go nightclub and develop a rabid fanbase. Jim's onstage antics and lewd performance of the group's song "The End" upset the club's owners, and the band is ejected from the venue. After the show, they are approached by producer Paul A. Rothchild and Jac Holzman of Elektra Records and are offered a deal to record their first album. The Doors are soon invited to perform on The Ed Sullivan Show, only to be told by one of the producers that they must change the lyric "girl we couldn't get much higher" in the song "Light My Fire". Despite this, Morrison performs the original lyric during the live broadcast and the band is not allowed to perform on the show again. As the Doors' success continues, Jim becomes increasingly infatuated with his own image as "The Lizard King" and develops an addiction with alcoholism and drugs. Jim meets Patricia Kennealy, a rock journalist involved in witchcraft, and participates in mystical ceremonies with her, including a handfasting ceremony. Meanwhile, an elder spirit watches these events. The rest of the band grows weary of Jim's missed recording sessions and absences at concerts. Jim arrives late to a Miami, Florida concert, becoming increasingly confrontational towards the audience and allegedly exposing himself onstage. The incident is a low point for the band, resulting in criminal charges against Jim, cancellations of shows, breakdowns in Jim's personal relationships, and resentment from the other band members. In 1970, following a lengthy trial, Jim is found guilty of indecent exposure, and ordered to serve time in prison. However, he is allowed to remain free on bail, pending the results of an appeal. Patricia tells Jim that she is pregnant with his child, but Jim convinces her to have an abortion. Jim visits his bandmates for the final time, attending a party hosted by Ray where he wishes the band luck in their future endeavors and gives each of them a copy of his poetry book An American Prayer. As Jim plays in the front garden with the children, he sees that one of them is his childhood self and comments, "This is the strangest life I've ever known" (a lyric from his song "Waiting for the Sun"). In 1971, Jim and Pam move to Paris, France to escape the pressures of the L.A. lifestyle. One evening, Pam finds Jim dead in the bathtub of their apartment. The film's final scenes before the credits roll are of Jim's gravesite in Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, while "The Severed Garden (Adagio)" (from An American Prayer) plays in the background. Just before the closing credits, the screen whites out and text appears stating that "Jim Morrison is said to have died of heart failure. He was 27. Pam joined him three years later." During the closing credits, the band is shown recording the song "L.A. Woman" in the studio. 

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Devdas is a young man from a wealthy Bengali Brahmin family in India in the early 1900s. Parvati (Paro) is a young woman from a middle class Bengali Brahmin family. The two families live in a village called Taalshonapur in Bengal, and Devdas and Parvati are childhood friends. Devdas goes away for a couple of years to live and study in the city of Calcutta (now Kolkata). During vacations, he returns to his village. Suddenly both realise that their easy comfort in each other's innocent comradeship has changed to something deeper. Devdas sees that Parvati is no longer the small girl he knew. Parvati looks forward to their childhood love blossoming into a happy lifelong journey in marriage. According to prevailing social custom, Parvati's parents would have to approach Devdas's parents and propose marriage of Parvati to Devdas as Parvati longs for. Parvati's mother approaches Devdas's mother, Harimati, with a marriage proposal. Although Devdas's mother loves Parvati very much she isn't so keen on forming an alliance with the family next door. Besides, Parvati's family has a long-standing tradition of accepting dowry from the groom's family for marriage rather than sending dowry with the bride. The alternative family tradition of Parvati's family influences Devdas's mother's decision not to consider Parvati as Devdas' bride, especially as Parvati belongs to a trading (becha -kena chottoghor) lower family. The "trading" label is applied in context of the marriage custom followed by Parvati's family. Devdas's father, Narayan Mukherjee, who also loves Parvati, does not want Devdas to get married so early in life and isn't keen on the alliance. Parvati's father, Nilkantha Chakravarti, feeling insulted at the rejection, finds an even richer husband for Parvati. When Parvati learns of her planned marriage, she stealthily meets Devdas at night, desperately believing that he will accept her hand in marriage. Devdas has never previously considered Parvati as his would-be wife. Surprised by Parvati's boldly visiting him alone at night, he also feels pained for her. Making up his mind, he tells his father he wants to marry Parvati. Devdas's father disagrees. In a confused state, Devdas flees to Calcutta. From there, he writes a letter to Parvati, saying that they should simply continue only as friends. Within days, however, he realizes that he should have been bolder. He goes back to his village and tells Parvati that he is ready to do anything needed to save their love. By now, Parvati's marriage plans are in an advanced stage. She refuses to go back to Devdas and chides him for his cowardice and vacillation. She, however requests Devdas to come and see her before she dies. He vows to do so. Devdas goes back to Calcutta and Parvati is married off to the widower, Bhuvan Choudhuri, who has three children. An elderly gentleman and zamindar of Hatipota he had found his house and home so empty and lustreless after his wife's death, that he decided to marry again. After marrying Parvati, he spent most of his day in Pujas and looking after the zamindari. In Calcutta, Devdas's carousing friend, Chunni Lal, introduces him to a courtesan named Chandramukhi. Devdas takes to heavy drinking at the courtesan's place; she falls in love with him, and looks after him. His health deteriorates through excessive drinking and despair – a drawn-out form of suicide. In his mind, he frequently compares Parvati and Chandramukhi. Strangely he feels betrayed by Parvati, though it was she who had loved him first, and confessed her love for him. Chandramukhi knows and tells him how things had really happened. This makes Devdas, when sober, hate and loathe her very presence. He drinks more and more to forget his plight. Chandramukhi sees it all happen, suffering silently. She senses the real man behind the fallen, aimless Devdas he has become and can't help but love him. Knowing death approaches him fast, Devdas goes to Hatipota to meet Parvati to fulfill his vow. He dies at her doorstep on a dark, cold night. On hearing of his death, Parvati runs towards the door, but her family members prevent her from stepping out of the house. The novella powerfully depicts the customs of society that prevailed in Bengal in the early 1900s, which largely prevented a happy ending to a true and tender love story. 

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Mike, a street hustler, stands alone on a deserted stretch of highway. He starts talking to himself and notices that the road looks "like someone’s face, like a fucked-up face." He then experiences a narcoleptic episode and dreams of his mother comforting him as he replays home movies of his childhood in his mind. Later, after being fellated by a client in Seattle, Mike returns to his favorite spots to pick up more clients. He is picked up by a wealthy older woman who takes him to her mansion, where he finds two fellow hustlers also hired by the woman. One of them is Scott Favor, Mike's best friend, and the other is Gary. While preparing to have sex with the woman, Mike experiences another narcoleptic fit and awakens the next day with Scott in Portland, Oregon. Mike and Scott are soon reunited with Bob Pigeon, a middle-aged mentor to a gang of street kids and hustlers who live in an abandoned apartment building. Scott, the son of the mayor of Portland, admits to Bob in private that when he turns 21, he will inherit his father's fortune and retire from street hustling. Meanwhile, Mike yearns to find his mother, so he and Scott leave for Idaho to visit Mike's older brother, Richard. Along this journey Mike confesses that he is in love with Scott, who gently reminds him he only sleeps with men for money. While visiting in his trailer, Richard tries to tell Mike who his real father is, but Mike says that he knows it is Richard. Richard tells Mike that their mother works as a hotel maid; when Mike and Scott visit the hotel, they find she has gone to Italy in search of her own family. At the hotel, they meet Hans, the man who drove them to Portland, and prostitute themselves to him. With the money they received from Hans, Mike and Scott travel to Italy. They find the country farmhouse where Mike's mother worked as a maid and an English tutor. The young woman, Carmela, who lives there, tells Mike that his mother returned to the United States months ago. Carmela and Scott fall in love and return to the U.S., leaving Mike to return there on his own, broken-hearted. Scott's father dies, and Scott inherits his fortune. Back in Portland, Bob and his gang confront a newly reformed Scott at a fashionable restaurant, but he rejects them. That night Bob has a fatal heart attack. The next day the hustlers hold a rowdy funeral for Bob, while in the same cemetery, a few yards away, Scott attends a solemn funeral for his father. At the end of the film, Mike is back on the deserted stretch of the Idaho highway. After he falls into another narcoleptic stupor, two strangers pull up in a truck, take his backpack and shoes, and drive away. Moments later, an unidentified figure pulls up in a car, picks the unconscious Mike up, places him in the vehicle and drives away. 

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After Homer trips over Bart's skateboard and falls down the stairs, he is confined to the couch for several days with an injured back. As punishment, Marge makes Bart clean his room, where he discovers an old cherry bomb. At school the next day, he flushes it down a toilet in the boys' restroom while Principal Skinner's mother, Agnes, is using the adjacent girls' restroom. The resulting explosion blows her off the toilet seat and enrages Principal Skinner. Skinner proposes to Homer and Marge that Bart be deported by enrolling him in the school foreign exchange program. When Bart sees a picture of a lovely French château, he agrees to go there, much to Homer and Skinner's delight. The Simpsons host a student from Albania named Adil Hoxha. When Bart arrives at Château Maison, he finds a dilapidated farmhouse at a run-down vineyard. His hosts are two unscrupulous, abusive winemakers, César and his nephew Ugolin, who treat him like a slave. Bart is starved while being made to carry buckets of water, pick and crush grapes, sleep on the floor, and test wine contaminated with antifreeze. Adil arrives in Springfield and impresses Marge and Homer with his polite manners and help with household chores. They are unaware that Adil is actually an Albanian spy sent to obtain blueprints of the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant's reactor. Homer unwittingly takes him on a tour of the plant and thinks nothing when Adil takes many photographs, which he transmits to Albania with a fax machine hidden in Bart's tree house. When Bart's captors send him to town to buy a case of antifreeze, he asks a gendarme for help, but the man does not speak a word of English. Bart walks away, knocking himself for his inability to pick up the native language, when he suddenly begins speaking French. Realizing That he is now fluent, he tells the gendarme about the cruelty that he has suffered at the hands of the winemakers, and about their efforts to sell adulterated wine (with this crime being treated worse by the gendarme than Bart's actual exploitation). The men are swiftly arrested and Bart is hailed as a hero for exposing their scheme to sell adulterated wine. In Springfield, Adil is caught spying by the FBI and deported to Albania in exchange for the return of an American spy captured there. Bart returns home with gifts for his family. Homer has difficulty opening a wine bottle but is pleased to hear Bart speak French, unaware that Bart has called him a buffoon. 

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New Mexico State Police Sgt. Ben Peterson and Trooper Ed Blackburn discover a little girl wandering the desert, near Alamogordo, in shock and in a catatonic state. They take her to a nearby vacation trailer, located by a spotter aircraft, where they find evidence that the little girl had been there when it was attacked and nearly destroyed. It is later discovered that the trailer was owned by an FBI Special Agent named Ellinson, on vacation with his wife, son, and daughter; the other members of the girl's family remain missing. Now in an ambulance, the child briefly reacts to a pulsating high-pitched sound from the desert by sitting up in the stretcher. No one else notices her reaction, and she lies back down when the noise stops. At a general store owned by "Gramps" Johnson, Peterson and Blackburn find him dead and a wall of the store partially torn out. After a quick look-around, Peterson leaves Blackburn behind to secure the crime scene. Blackburn later goes outside to investigate a strange, pulsating sound. Gun shots are fired, the sound grows faster and louder, and Blackburn goes missing. Peterson's chief later points out that both Johnson and Blackburn had fired their weapons at their attacker. More puzzling is the coroner's report on Johnson's brutal death, which includes a huge amount of formic acid found in his body. The FBI sends Special Agent Robert Graham to New Mexico to investigate. After a strange footprint is found near the Ellisons' trailer, the Department of Agriculture sends myrmecologists Dr. Harold Medford (Edmund Gwenn) and his daughter, Dr. Pat Medford, to assist in the investigation. The elder Medford exposes the Ellinson girl to formic acid fumes, which rips her from her catatonia into a state of panic from "Them!" Medford's suspicions of camponotus vicinus are validated by her reaction, but he will not reveal his theory prematurely. At the Ellinson campsite, Pat encounters a giant, eight- foot-long foraging ant. Following instructions from the elder Medford, Peterson and Graham shoot off the ant's antennae, blinding it, and kill it using a Thompson submachine gun. Medford reveals his theory: a colony of giant ants, mutated by radiation from the first atomic bomb test near Alamogordo, is responsible for the deaths. General O'Brien orders an Army helicopter search, and the ants' nest is found. Cyanide gas bombs are tossed inside, and Graham, Peterson, and Pat descend into the nest to check for survivors. Deep inside, Pat finds evidence that two queen ants have hatched and escaped to establish new colonies. Peterson, Graham, and the Medfords join a government task force which covertly begins to investigate reports of unusual activity. In one a civilian pilot (Fess Parker) has been committed to a mental hospital after claiming that he was forced down by UFOs shaped like giant ants. Next, the Coast Guard receives a report of a giant queen hatching her brood in the hold of a freighter at sea in the Pacific; giant ants attack the ship's crew, and there are few survivors. The freighter is later sunk by U.S. Navy gunfire. A third report about a large sugar theft at a rail yard leads Peterson, Graham, and Major Kibbee to Los Angeles. An alcoholic (Olin Howland) in a hospital "drunk tank" claims he has seen giant ants outside his window. The mutilated body of a father is recovered, but his two young sons are missing. Peterson, Graham, and Kibbee find evidence that they were flying a model airplane in the Los Angeles River drainage channel near the hospital. Martial law is declared in Los Angeles, and troops are assigned to find the ant nest in the vast storm drain system under the city. Peterson finds the two missing boys alive, trapped by the ants near the nest. He calls for reinforcements and lifts both boys to safety, just before being attacked and grabbed by an ant in its mandibles. Graham arrives with reinforcements and kills the ant, but Peterson dies from his injuries as others swarm to protect the nearby nest. Graham and the soldiers fight off the ants, but a tunnel collapse traps Graham. Several ants charge, but he is able to hold them off with his submachine gun just long enough for troops to break through. The queen and her hatchlings are discovered and quickly destroyed with flamethrowers. Dr. Medford offers a philosophic observation: "When Man entered the Atomic Age, he opened the door to a new world. What we may eventually find in that new world, nobody can predict". 

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;Act I A quartet of dockyard workers mourn the start of a new work day ("I Feel Like I'm Not Out of Bed Yet"). The whistle blows at 6AM, and three sailors emerge: Ozzie, Chip, and Gabey, excited for 24 hours of shore leave ("New York, New York"). Chip is excited to see all the sights that his father told him about after his trip to New York in 1934, with his decade-old guidebook by his side. Ozzie is interested in finding a date (or several) because Manhattan women are the prettiest in the world. Gabey is looking for one special girl, hopefully one who reminds him of his 7th grade girlfriend, Minnie Frenchley. On the subway, the three spot a poster of Ivy Smith, "Miss Turnstiles" for the month of June. Gabey, overcome with love for the picture, takes it with him. An old lady angrily tells him that she will have him arrested for vandalism, and the three run off. Gabey wants to meet Ivy Smith, despite Chip's protests that the city is too big for things like that to happen. Ozzie, recounting an incident where Gabey saved their lives, convinces Chip to help Gabey find her. Chip grudgingly agrees and Ozzie coaches Gabey on what to do once he meets Ivy ("Gabey's Comin'," performed in the 2014 Broadway revival). The three break up, Gabey to Carnegie Hall, Ozzie to the Museum of Modern Art, and Chip to the "subway people." The three imagine what Miss Turnstiles must be like, and a ballet is performed in which Ivy demonstrates all the many different, contradictory, skills she has. The little old lady finds a policeman, and the two chase after the sailors. A young female cabbie named Hildy is found asleep in her cab by her irate boss S. Uperman. He fires her and tells her to return the cab in an hour or he will call the police. Looking for one last fare, she comes across Chip. It's love at first sight, at least for Hildy. She forcefully kisses Chip, but Chip wants nothing more than to find Ivy. Hildy tempts him into taking a tour of the city, but all the places he wants to go (the Hippodrome, the Forrest Theatre to see Tobacco Road, the New York City Aquarium, and the Woolworth Building) are either no longer in existence or no longer notable. The only place Hildy wants to take Chip is her apartment ("Come Up to My Place"). Mr. Uperman joins the lady and the cop in the chase, implying Hildy stole the cab. Ozzie goes to the museum, but mistakenly arrives at the Museum of Natural History instead of the Museum of Modern Art. There he meets a budding anthropologist, Claire de Loone. She is amazed at his resemblance to a prehistoric man, and asks him for his measurements. He mistakes her scientific interest for romantic interest, but as she explains, she is engaged to be married to the famous Judge Pitkin W. Bridgework. Pitkin has taught her to learn to know men scientifically, but she, like Ozzie, often gets "Carried Away." The two of them accidentally knock over a dinosaur. Waldo Figment, the professor who built the dinosaur, joins Uperman, the cop, and the lady in the chase. Gabey mopes around the city. Without love, New York is nothing but a "Lonely Town." At Carnegie Hall, Ivy Smith is taking lessons from Madame Dilly, a drunk who clearly has no knowledge of vocal training. Ivy is not quite as glamorous as the Miss Turnstiles contest has made her out to be. In reality, while she is studying to do all the things they said she was, she is nothing more than a "cooch dancer" at Coney Island. When Madame Dilly leaves to refill her flask, Gabey enters. He asks Ivy to go out with him, and to his surprise, she accepts. Gabey leaves ecstatically. Madame Dilly advises Ivy to break the date as "sex and art don't mix" ("Carnegie Hall Pavane") Ozzie accompanies Claire back to her apartment, where he meets Claire's fiancé, Pitkin W. Bridgework. They try desperately to explain what they are doing together, but Pitkin does not mind ("I Understand"). He leaves them alone to go to a meeting, reminding Claire that they are to meet at Diamond Eddie's to celebrate their engagement. The two take advantage of their alone time ("Carried Away (reprise)") Hildy brings Chip and an armful of groceries back to her apartment, promising to cook for him. Chip insists that he must leave to find Ivy. She tells him to call the IRT, but they refuse to give Chip her address or phone number. He decides that he has tried hard enough, and he and Hildy attempt to get physical when her roommate, Lucy Schmeeler, home from work with a cold, intrudes. Hildy finally gets rid of her by convincing her to go to an air-cooled movie. Hildy seduces Chip, bragging about her many talents, not the least of which is her cooking ("I Can Cook Too"). Gabey's attitude has done a full 180, and he feels "Lucky to Be Me." Ivy, about to meet Gabey at Nedick's, runs into Madame Dilly, who reminds her that if she doesn't do her cooch dance that night, she'll be fired, and won't be able to pay to Madame Dilly for her lessons . Madame Dilly threatens to smear her reputation, and she is forced to stand Gabey up. Chip and Ozzie both arrive at Nedick's with Hildy and Claire both dressed as Ivy Smith. Gabey isn't fooled, and tells them the story of how he met her. Just then, Madame Dilly arrives with a message from Ivy: she will not be coming because she instead elected to go to a fancy party. Gabey is alone and dejected, but Hildy tells him that she can get him a date: Lucy. The five go into a dance demonstrating the nightlife of the city. ;Act II At Diamond Eddie's, the dancers perform a number ("So Long Baby"). Gabey is still hung up on Miss Turnstiles, and Lucy hasn't shown up yet. A singer, Diana Dream, performs a very sad song, "I Wish I Was Dead," which causes Gabey to feel even sadder. Lucy calls, having accidentally gone to the Diamond Eddie's in Yonkers. The group decides to go to the Congacabana at the suggestion of Claire, but on their way out, they run into Pitkin. Ozzie and Claire try to explain the situation, but as before, all Pitkin says is "I Understand (reprise)." The gang leaves for the Congacabana while Pitkin stays behind to pay the check. At the Congacabana, Dolores Dolores (the same performer as "Diana Dream") sings the same sad song as before, in Spanish. Hildy interrupts her, saying she had gotten a request to sing. Hildy, as well as Ozzie, Claire, and Chip, try to lift Gabey's spirits by reminding him that he can count on them ("Ya Got Me"). As they are about to depart for another nightclub, the Slam Bang Club, Pitkin arrives ("I Understand (reprise)"). Claire tells him once again to pay the check, also to wait for Lucy and come to the Slam Bang later. At the Slam Bang Club, Madame Dilly is in a drunken stupor. Gabey asks her where Ivy is, and she lets it slip that she is at Coney Island. Gabey runs off to find her. Chip and Ozzie, afraid that he won't be able to get back to the ship on time, rush after him. On their way out, they come across Lucy and Pitkin. Claire once again leaves him to go with Ozzie. Pitkin recalls all the times in his life that he "understood" and realizes he's been played the fool by everyone, including Claire ("Pitkin's Song (I Understand)"). He also bonds with Lucy and the two of them join the chase along with the little old lady, the police officers, Figment, and Uperman. Riding the Subway, Gabey dreams about Coney Island and Ivy. An extended dance sequence occurs with Ivy and a dream Gabey in a boxing match ("Subway Ride/The Great Lover Displays Himself/The Imaginary Coney Island"). The other four have just missed Gabey and are riding another subway car. They wonder about their future after the men have to go back to the ship ("Some Other Time"). At Coney Island, Ivy, along with several other girls, dances in a show called Rajah Bimmy's Harem Scarem ("The Real Coney Island"). Gabey sees Ivy and accidentally tears her already skimpy outfit off. She is arrested for indecent exposure as the chasers arrive and demand the others be arrested. Claire hopes Pitkin will get her out of the situation, but he no longer trusts her and has the three men brought to the naval authorities. The girls ask Pitkin if he's ever "committed an indiscretion," which he staunchly refuses. Just then, he sneezes in the same way as Lucy Schmeeler, casting doubt on his claim. As the clock chimes six, the sailors prepare to get back on the ship. Just then, the girls come running to them, telling them that Pitkin understood. They say a fond farewell as three new sailors leave the ship, eager to have their own adventures in New York City ("New York, New York (reprise)/Finale Act II"). 

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As the Federation starship Enterprise, under the command of Captain Jean-Luc Picard, waits to rendezvous with the USS Victory, Chief Engineer La Forge and Commander Data go to the Holodeck to recreate a Sherlock Holmes mystery. Data, playing Holmes, has memorized all of the Holmes stories, and recognizes and solves the mystery within minutes. Frustrated, Geordi leaves the holodeck, leaving Data confused. In Ten Forward, Geordi explains that the fun is in solving the unknown; Data does not understand. Overhearing their conversation, Chief Medical Officer Dr. Pulaski asserts that Data is incapable of solving a mystery to which he does not already know the outcome. Data accepts Dr. Pulaski's challenge and invites her to join them on the Holodeck. There, Geordi instructs the computer to create a unique Sherlock Holmes mystery with an adversary who is capable of defeating Data. In the new program, Dr. Pulaski is kidnapped, and Data investigates. They soon discover that Professor Moriarty is responsible, but when they find him with Pulaski in his hideout, they are shocked when they learn that Moriarty is aware of the Holodeck program being a simulation, and is able to access the Holodeck computer, showing them a sketch of the Enterprise he has drawn based on the computer's description. Data and Geordi leave the Holodeck to alert the Captain, and Geordi realizes that when he asked the computer to create the program he had asked for an adversary who could defeat Data, not Sherlock Holmes; as a result, the computer gave the Holodeck character Professor Moriarty the intelligence and cunning needed to challenge Data, plus the ability to access the ship's computer. When Moriarty gains access to ship stabilizer controls, Data returns to the Holodeck with Captain Picard. Picard meets Moriarty, who demonstrates that he has evolved beyond his original programming and asks to continue to exist in the real world. Picard tells Moriarty that this would not be possible; instead, he saves the program and tells Moriarty that if they ever discover a way to convert Holodeck matter into a permanent form they will bring him back. Picard discontinues the program and the USS Victory arrives, with La Forge preparing to present a model of the historic HMS Victory. LeVar Burton, Diana Muldaur, and Brent Spiner on set 

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The Standish Sanitarium, owned by Judy Standish (Maureen O'Sullivan), has fallen on hard times. Banker J.D. Morgan (Douglass Dumbrille), who owns a nearby racetrack and nightclub, holds the mortgage to the sanitarium and is attempting to gain control of it in order to convert the building into a casino. Judy's faithful employee Tony (Chico Marx), suggests asking financial help from the wealthy hypochondriacal patient Mrs. Emily Upjohn (Margaret Dumont). After she has been given a clean bill of health by the doctors at the Sanitarium, Mrs. Upjohn threatens to leave for treatment by Dr. Hugo Z. Hackenbush (Groucho Marx), who - and unknown to Mrs. Upjohn - is actually a horse doctor. Tony overhears Mrs. Upjohn's praise of Hackenbush and immediately tells her that Dr. Hackenbush has been hired to run the sanitarium. Mrs. Upjohn is elated and informs Judy with Dr. Hackenbush in charge she will consider helping her financially. Tony then wires Dr. Hackenbush in Florida to come and care for Mrs. Upjohn at the sanitarium. Soon, Dr. Hackenbush arrives and instantly begins insulting the sanitarium's crooked business manager Mr. Whitmore (Leonard Ceeley). Whitmore, who is Morgan's right-hand man, is immediately suspicious of Hackenbush's medical background. Meanwhile, Judy's fiancé, Gil Stewart (Allan Jones), who works singing in Morgan's nightclub, has just spent his life's savings on a racehorse named Hi-Hat. His hope is that the horse, which he purchased from Morgan, will win a big race and the prize money will allow Judy to save the sanitarium. Hi-Hat is so afraid of Morgan, that the horse rears in terror whenever he sees Morgan or hears his voice. Unfortunately, Gil now has no money to pay for Hi-Hat's feed, and he, Tony and Stuffy (Harpo Marx), Hi-Hat's jockey, have to resort to trickery to fend off the Sheriff (Robert Middlemass) who has come to the racetrack to collect money for the feed bill. Tony raises some money by scamming Hackenbush in the "Tutsi Fruitsy Ice Cream" scene, in which Tony gives Hackenbush a tip on a horse, but all in code, so that Hackenbush has to buy book after book from Tony to decipher the code. At the sanitarium, the suspicious Whitmore attempts to telephone the Florida Medical Board for information on Hackenbush's background. Hackenbush intercepts the call and by assuming a phony southern accent, feigning a hurricane with an electric fan and repeatedly calling Whitmore to the dictagraph, Hackenbush manages to enrage him to the point that Whitmore slams down the phone in frustration and gives up. At a night gala at which Gil performs along Vivien Fay and her ballet (“On Blue Venetian Waters”), Hackenbush invites a blonde floozie named "Flo" (Esther Muir) and Mrs. Upjohn to his room at the sanitarium without the latter knowing of the other woman. Being persecuted, Tony and Stuffy blend with the musicians and perform their signature Chico/Harpo musical performances, including a scene in which Stuffy tears a piano apart in anger. Whitmore attempts to get Hackenbush fired by having Mrs. Upjohn catch him in a compromising situation with Flo. Hackenbush is rescued by Stuffy and Tony who overhear the plot, then pose as house detectives and then as paperhangers. They make a complete shambles of Hackenbush's suite with layers of wallpaper and buckets of paste; Mrs. Upjohn and Whitmore arrive, but the woman is nowhere to be seen, having been stuffed under the cushions of the sofa. The following day, just as Mrs. Upjohn is about to sign an agreement to help Judy, Whitmore brings in an eminent Viennese physician, Dr. Leopold X. Steinberg (Sig Ruman), whom he hopes will examine Mrs. Upjohn and discredit Hackenbush. After Mrs. Upjohn agrees to the examination, Hackenbush wants to flee for fear of being exposed as a fraud; Gil, Tony and Stuffy remind him that Judy still needs his help and persuade him to stay. After making a shambles of Mrs Upjohn's examination, Hackenbush, Tony, Stuffy and Gil hide out in Hi-Hat's stable, where Judy soon joins them. The Brothers and eventually Gil try to comfort Judy (“Tomorrow Is Another Day”), who is upset by the negative light of the situation at the sanitarium. Near the stable, Stuffy starts sympathizing with a community of poor folk who believe him to be archangel Gabriel (“Gabriel (Who Dat Man)”). As the musical number progresses (“All God's Chillun Got Rhythm”, “Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen”), the police arrives and the Brothers intent to disguise themselves by painting their faces with grease in blackface. The attempt fails as everybody runs off and Whitmore finally exposes Hackenbush as a horse doctor with a letter he received from the Florida Medical Board. Morgan is about to have them arrested when Hi-Hat hears Morgan's voice and bolts, jumping several obstacles in the way. Whitmore finally exposes Hackenbush as a horse doctor with a letter he received from the Florida Medical Board and Morgan is about to have them arrested when Hi-Hat hears Morgan's voice and bolts, jumping several obstacles in the way. Gil realizes that Hi-Hat is a jumper, and the following day enters him in the steeplechase race. Morgan, who witnessed Hi-Hat's jumping ability, tries to prevent him from being entered in the race. After intentionally delaying the race several times and getting past Morgan and the Sheriff, the boys, Gil and Judy manage to get Hi-Hat onto the track and the race finally begins. Knowing that Hi-Hat is afraid of Morgan, everyone works to make Hi-Hat aware of his presence before reaching the fence. On the last lap, Hi-Hat and Morgan's horse wipe out; when they reach the finish line, it appears that Morgan's horse has won; Stuffy realizes that the mud-covered horses were switched after the accident, and Morgan's jockey was riding Hi-Hat in the finish, thus making Hi-Hat the winner. The black folk arrive at the race and start walking with Gil, Judy and the Brothers through the racetrack, singing the final number ("A Message from the Man in the Moon"). 

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Seaguy is a super-hero who has never really had an adventure and spends his days in New Venice playing chess with Death, watching Mickey Eye (a cartoon show about an all-seeing, all-knowing, psychopathic eye, and an obvious spoof on Mickey Mouse) and going to the Mickey Eye amusement park. He constantly expresses his wish to go on adventures and impress a beautiful bearded warrior woman named She-Beard, but he never seems to get around to it because he's told the world doesn't need heroes anymore. However, when Seaguy and Chubby discover that a new food staple called Xoo is sentient, they decide to protect it from evil forces and bring it home. Seaguy exists in a seemingly perfect world in which all the super-heroes no longer save lives or do much of anything except ride the rides at the Mickey Eye amusement park. It is public knowledge that all the evil in the world was finally destroyed after a powerful entity called the Anti-Dad was destroyed by all the super-heroes, effectively leaving the heroes without jobs. The style of the book is equal parts dark tragedy and light-hearted whimsy as the main character travels from one adventure to the other, but with each adventure becoming more tragic than the one before it, until Seaguy discovers the secret history of the moon. 

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Near the end of their senior year of high school, noble underachiever Lloyd Dobler falls for valedictorian Diane Court and plans to ask her out, though they belong to different social groups. Lloyd lives with his sister Constance, a single mother, and has no plans for his future. Diane comes from a sheltered academic upbringing and lives with her doting divorced father Jim, who owns the retirement home where she works. She is due to take up a fellowship in England at the end of the summer. Diane accompanies Lloyd to a party, surprising their classmates. During a dinner at the Court household, where Lloyd fails to impress Diane's family, Jim is informed that he is under investigation by the Internal Revenue Service. Diane takes Lloyd to meet the residents of the retirement home and he teaches her to drive the manual-transmission Ford Tempo her father gave her as a graduation present. Their relationship grows intimate and they have sex, to her father's concern. Lloyd's musician friend Corey, who has never gotten over her cheating ex-boyfriend, Joe, warns him to take care of Diane. Jim urges Diane to break up with Lloyd, feeling he is not an appropriate match, and suggests she give Lloyd a pen as a parting gift. Diane tells Lloyd she wants to stop seeing him and concentrate on her studies, and tells him to take her pen. Devastated, Lloyd seeks advice from Corey, who tells him to "be a man". Jim's credit cards are declined when he tries to buy Diane a luggage set. At dawn, Lloyd plays "In Your Eyes" by Peter Gabriel, the song that was playing the first time they slept together, on a boombox under her open bedroom window. The next day, Diane meets with the IRS investigator, who explains that they have evidence suggesting Jim has been embezzling funds from his retirement-home residents. He advises her to accept the fellowship as matters with her father will worsen. After Diane discovers cash concealed at home, Jim tells her he stole the money to give her financial independence, justifying it by saying he provided better care to the victims of his embezzlement than their families did. Distraught, she reconciles with Lloyd at the gym where he trains. Some time later, Jim is incarcerated. Lloyd visits him in a federal penitentiary and tells him that he will go with Diane to England; Jim reacts with anger. Lloyd gives him a letter from Diane saying she cannot forgive him, but she arrives to say goodbye and they embrace. She gives him a pen, asking him to write to her in England. Lloyd escorts Diane, who is afraid of flying, on her flight. 

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Buster Edwards (Phil Collins) is a petty criminal from the East End of 1963 London. His long- suffering wife June (Julie Walters) thinks of him as a lovable rogue. The film opens with Buster walking along his local high street. He breaks into a shop to steal a suit, into which he then changes to attend a funeral. Buster brings Harry (Michael Attwell), who has been used on other 'jobs' and has recently served 18 months in prison for his part in previous robberies, to discuss the next 'job' with the ring-leader Bruce Reynolds (Larry Lamb). Harry wants 'in' and becomes part of the firm who are planning to rob a Royal Mail train allegedly carrying up to £1 million in cash. After a complex and successful heist, the gang return to their farmhouse hideout to stay out of sight and split the spoils. They find they have stolen over £3 million − much more than they have anticipated or reported by the media. Members of the gang are shown drinking from beer bottles and glasses without wearing gloves, thereby leaving fingerprints which would be evidence of their involvement in the robbery. While lying low at the farmhouse they hear on the radio that the police are searching farmhouses and outhouses within a radius of the robbery site. The gang become nervous and some members want to immediately return to London for fear of discovery; others think they should keep to the original plan and stay put. The gang decide to return to London, where they meet their 'contact', a solicitor's clerk who, as in the original plan, arranges for the farmhouse to be 'cleared and cleaned', thereby destroying any physical evidence linking the gang to the robbery. The contact states he will bring the plans forward from a few weeks to the next two to three days. Bruce, Buster and Harry are not happy with any delay at all because they fear imminent discovery, so they set off back to the farmhouse in their own car, to do the job themselves. During the journey they hear on the car radio that the farmhouse hideout has been discovered, so they abandon their plans and return to London, hoping they will have time to escape with their families. Buster returns home. He is devastated to find that June has had a miscarriage while he was committing the robbery. She cannot believe it when she learns of his involvement in what has been quickly dubbed "The Great Train Robbery". For several months after the robbery, Buster and June remain in hiding with their young daughter Nicky (Ellie Beaven) until they are turned in to the police by a suspicious neighbour. Buster flees to Acapulco where he is met by fellow Great Train Robber, Bruce Reynolds, and his girlfriend Franny (Stephanie Lawrence), who are also on the run and living it up in the sun on the profits of the crime. June and Nicky arrive, despite the disapproval of her mother (Sheila Hancock), and although Nicky seems to love her new life in the sun, June is immediately unimpressed with their new way of life and resolves to return to England, despite knowing that if Buster is to return with them he will be imprisoned (The real Buster Edwards plays a small cameo during the arrival in Acapulco. He is seen walking out of the airport with his girlfriend, played by Phil Collins’ wife, just before Buster, June, and Nicky). Buster remains in Acapulco for some time after June leaves, until realising (while celebrating England's 1966 World Cup triumph) that having money and the sun means nothing if he doesn't have his family, so he returns to England to accept his punishment. The film closes 12 years after Buster's release from jail, showing him seemingly content and running a flower stall near London's Waterloo Bridge. 

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Corie and Paul Bratter are a newlywed couple. For their first home, they live in an apartment on the top floor of a brownstone in New York City. Corie is optimistic about their future together, while Paul, the more anxious and grounded half of the couple, worries about the various flaws in the apartment, such as a hole in the skylight, their leaky closet, and the lack of a bathtub. Shortly after moving in, Corie attempts to set her mother up with their eccentric neighbor Mr. Velasco. During the course of four days, the couple learns to live together while facing the usual daily ups-and-downs. Corie wants Paul to become more easy-going: for example, to run "barefoot in the park". 

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Marian MacAlpin works in a market research firm, writing survey questions and sampling products. She shares the top-floor apartment of a house in Toronto (never named in the novel) with her roommate Ainsley and dates a dependable and boring boyfriend, Peter. Marian also keeps in touch with Clara, a friend from college, who is now a constantly pregnant housewife. Ainsley announces she wants to have a baby – and intends to do it without getting married. When Marian is horrified, Ainsley replies, "The thing that ruins families these days is the husbands." Looking for a man who will have no interest in fatherhood, she sets her sights on Marian's "womanizer" friend Len, who is infamous for his relationships with young, naive girls. At work, Marian is assigned the task of gathering responses for a survey about a new brand of beer. While walking from house to house asking people their opinions, she meets Duncan, a graduate student in English who intrigues her with his atypical and eccentric answers. Marian later has a dinner date with Peter and Len, during which Ainsley shows up dressed as a virginal schoolgirl – the first stage of her plan to trick Len into impregnating her. Marian finds herself disassociating from her body as Peter recounts a gory rabbit hunt to Len: > "After a while I noticed that a large drop of something wet had materialized > on the table. I poked it with my finger and smudged it around a little > before I realized with horror that it was a tear." Marian runs from the restaurant and is chased down by Peter in his car. Unaware of Ainsley's plan to get pregnant by Len, Peter chides, "Ainsley behaved herself properly, why couldn't you?" At the end of the night, Peter proposes to her. When asked to choose a date for the wedding, Marian slips into unexpected passivity: > "'I’d rather have you decide that. I’d rather leave the big decisions up to > you.' I was astonished at myself. I’d never said anything remotely like that > to him before. The funny thing was that I really meant it." Marian and Duncan have a surprise meeting in a laundromat, engage in awkward conversation, and kiss. Shortly afterwards, Marian's problems with food begin when she finds herself empathizing with a steak that Peter is eating, imagining it "knocked on the head as it stood in a queue like someone waiting for a streetcar." After this, she is unable to eat meat – anything with "bone or tendon or fiber". Ainsley's plot to seduce Len succeeds. When Len later learns that Ainsley is pregnant, he talks to Marian, who confesses that pregnancy was Ainsley's plan all along. Len reveals his childhood fear of eggs, and from that point Marian can no longer face her soft-boiled egg in the morning. Soon thereafter, she is unable to eat vegetables or cake. Peter decides to throw a party, to which Marian invites "the office virgins" from her work, Duncan, and Duncan's roommates. Peter suggests that Marian buy herself a new dress for his party – something less "mousy" than her normal wardrobe. Marian submits to his wishes and buys a daring red dress. Before the party, Ainsley does Marian's makeup, including false eyelashes and a big lipsticked smile. When Duncan arrives, he says, "You didn't tell me it was a masquerade. Who the hell are you supposed to be?" He leaves and Marian follows. They end up going to a sleazy hotel, where they have unsatisfying sex. The next morning, they go out to breakfast and Marian finds that she cannot eat anything. After Duncan leaves, Marian realizes that Peter is metaphorically devouring her. To test him, she bakes a pink cake in the shape of a woman and dares him to eat it. "This is what you really want", she says, offering the cake woman as a substitute to him feeding upon her. Peter leaves disturbed. Once Peter leaves, Marian feels hungry and realizes it's just a cake so she starts eating it. Marian returns to her first person narrative in the closing pages of the book. Duncan shows up at her apartment; Marian offers him the remains of the cake, which he polishes off. "'Thank you,' he said, licking his lips. 'It was delicious.'" 

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In 1987, young and geeky Jenna Rink yearns to be popular, but can only persuade the "Six Chicks" – the ruling clique led by Lucy "Tom-Tom" Wyman – to attend her 13th- birthday party by doing their homework. Jenna's best friend, Matt "Matty" Flamhaff, brings her a pink dollhouse he made himself, and a packet of "magic wishing dust" he sprinkles on the dollhouse roof. The Six Chicks arrive with the cutest boys in class, and trick Jenna into playing "seven minutes in heaven". While Jenna waits blindfolded in a closet, expecting to kiss one of the boys, the Six Chicks and the boys leave with her completed homework, and Matty finds Jenna alone. Humiliated, she tearfully wishes to be 30, as the wishing dust falls on her. The next morning, Jenna awakens in a luxurious Fifth Avenue apartment – her wish has come true: It is now 2004, and Jenna is 30, with no memory of the intervening 17 years. Jenna discovers she works for Poise, her favorite fashion magazine, with her co-editor and best friend Lucy. Poise has been scooped so often by rival magazine Sparkle that editor-in-chief Richard believes someone is tipping them off. Jenna finds Matty's address and races to Greenwich Village where the adult Matt, a struggling photographer, is unable to fill in her missing past, as she became head of the "Six Chicks (Now Seven Chicks)" and stopped speaking to him. Lucy is revealed to be the adult Tom-Tom, having had plastic surgery. While delighting in her freedom, Jenna stumbles through adult life, learning enough to advise the 13-year-olds she prefers to spend time with. She saves a Poise party by leading the guests, including Matt, in an impromptu performance of the "Thriller" line dance. Her slowly emerging past reveals that the adult Jenna is nothing like the sweet, shy girl she was the day before. This Jenna stole ideas, refused to speak to her parents, and had office sex with a co-worker's husband. The struggling magazine is forced to redesign, and Jenna overhears Lucy badmouthing her, planning to cut Jenna out of her redesign presentation. Jenna returns to her childhood home in New Jersey, weeping in the same basement closet and reuniting with her parents. She apologizes to Matt, and hires him for her yearbook-inspired redesign photoshoot. Even though Matt is engaged to Wendy, who is eager for him to move to Chicago, Jenna and Matt begin to fall for each other. Jenna's plans to save the magazine are a rousing success, while Lucy's presentation fails, and she lies to Matt that Jenna decided not to use his pictures. Looking for Matt to deliver the good news, Jenna finds Wendy, who reveals their wedding is the next day. Richard informs Jenna that Lucy gave Jenna's material, including Matt's photographs, to Sparkle and has become their new editor-in-chief, effectively killing Poise. Jenna confronts Lucy, who scornfully reveals that she discovered Jenna was the one sabotaging her own magazine; Lucy merely stole the job Jenna was to receive. Jenna rushes to Matt's childhood home, next door to hers, where the wedding will soon be underway. Finding Matt, she declares that she is not the bad person she seemed to be, and that he would marry her if he could see who she really was. Matt, already in his tuxedo, tells her they cannot turn back time, but reveals the pink dollhouse he has kept for 17 years. In tears, Jenna asks for it back, and Matt sadly confesses that he always loved her. Jenna sits with the dollhouse as the wedding begins, and sees a young Matt and herself inside. She shuts her eyes, and specks of the wishing dust whirl around her. Opening her eyes, Jenna finds herself back in 1987 on her 13th birthday. This time, when Matty finds her alone in the closet, she kisses him. Confronting Lucy, Jenna rips up the homework and runs upstairs with Matty. With this second chance, Jenna lives the intervening 17 years properly, with her and Matt emerging in 2004 as a newly married couple. They share their favorite candy, Razzles, while moving into a pink house identical to the dollhouse. 

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Recent Georgetown University graduates Alec (Judd Nelson), his girlfriend, Leslie (Ally Sheedy), Kevin (Andrew McCarthy), Jules (Demi Moore), and Kirby (Emilio Estevez) are waiting to hear about the conditions of their friends, Wendy (Mare Winningham), a sweet-natured girl devoted to helping others, and Billy (Rob Lowe), a former fraternity boy and now reluctant husband and father, after a minor car accident caused by Billy's drinking. At the hospital, Kirby spots a medical student named Dale (Andie MacDowell), with whom he has been infatuated since college. The group gathers at their favorite college hangout, St. Elmo’s Bar. Billy, trapped in an unstable marriage, has been fired from the job that Alec helped him secure. At their apartment, Alec pressures Leslie to marry him, but she thinks they are unprepared to make such a commitment. Kirby is telling Kevin of his love for Dale when Billy shows up, asking to spend the night as he cannot cope with his wife. Jules accuses Kevin of being gay and loving Alec. When Kevin visits Alec and Leslie for dinner, Alec, during a private moment with Kevin, confesses he recently had sex with a lingerie saleswoman. Billy and Wendy get drunk together, and Wendy reveals that she’s a virgin. They kiss, and Billy, tugging at her clothing, makes fun of her girdle. Wendy insists they just remain friends because she thinks that he’s trying to take advantage of her. At St. Elmo’s, Jules reveals to Leslie she is having an affair with her married boss. Billy sees his wife with another man in the crowd and attacks him. Billy is jettisoned from the bar but reconciles with his wife. The girls confront Jules about her affair and reckless spending, but she insists that everything is under control. Kirby takes a job working for Mr. Kim, a wealthy Korean businessman, and invites Dale to a party that he’s holding at Mr. Kim’s house (which he is using without Mr. Kim's permission). Wendy arrives with Howie, an ungainly Jewish boy whom her parents want her to marry. Alec announces that he and Leslie are engaged, upsetting her. She confronts him about her suspicions of his infidelity, and the two break up. Alec accuses Kevin of telling Leslie about the tryst with the lingerie woman. Jules gives Billy a ride home, and Billy makes a pass at her. Furious, Jules orders him out of her car, and Billy’s wife witnesses the confrontation. When Dale skips the party, Kirby drives to the ski lodge where she is staying and meets her tall, handsome boyfriend. Kirby's borrowed car gets stuck, and Dale and her boyfriend invite him in. The next morning, as Kirby prepares to leave the lodge, Dale tells him that she’s flattered by his interest in her. He kisses her, and then poses for a photo with her (taken by her boyfriend) before leaving. Dale watches Kirby as he drives off. Leslie goes to Kevin’s apartment to spend the night after the breakup and discovers photographs of her. Kevin confesses his love for her, and the two sleep together. Alec goes to the apartment to apologize to Kevin and finds Leslie there, and then Alec and Leslie argue. Wendy tells her father that she wants to be independent and move into her own place. Jules has been fired from her job, fallen behind on her credit card payments, and her possessions have been seized. Jules locks herself in her apartment and opens the windows, intending to freeze to death. Her friends attempt to coax her out, but she is unresponsive. Kirby fetches Billy, who landed a job at a gas station courtesy of Kevin, to calm Jules down. Billy convinces Jules to let him in, and the two share a very tender talk about the challenges of life, overheard by the rest of the gang. Wendy moves into her own place, where Billy visits and informs her that he is getting a divorce and moving to New York City, and the two have sex. At the bus station, the group gathers once more to say goodbye to Billy. Billy urges Alec to make up with Leslie, but she declares that she does not want to date anyone for a while. Alec and Kevin make up, and the group makes plans to meet for brunch. However, they decide not to go to St. Elmo's and instead choose Houlihan's because there are "not so many kids" there. 

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Brian Flanagan, having just finished his stint in the Army, heads back to New York City and meets his Uncle Pat at his bar. He talks about making a million dollars. Brian goes to many interviews but is laughed out of all the corporate jobs because he lacks a degree. Brian gets a part-time job as a bartender at night while studying for a business degree by day. Over time, he learns the tricks of the trade, including flairing, from his mentor, Doug Coughlin. His advice usually begins with "Coughlin's Law." Brian quits college, maintaining his personal aspirations, but Doug is wary of the two starting their own bar together. Doug intends to call his bar "Cocktails & Dreams." Eventually, Brian and Doug's bartending act becomes popular and they end up working at a trendy nightclub. As their popularity rises, Brian becomes the focus of attention from a brunette named Coral. Coral is a wealthy photographer. Doug is alarmed that Coral is coming between their partnership and bets Brian that Coral will leave by week's end. Unbeknownst to Brian, Doug tricks Coral into sleeping with him. He secures his bet by sharing a kiss with Coral in front of Brian. Coral breaks up with Brian. Brian and Doug get into a fight, ending their partnership. Three years later, Brian has taken a job in Jamaica as a bartender at a resort to raise money for his own place. He finds a romantic partner in Jordan Mooney, an aspiring artist and waitress that he meets on the beach. Doug shows up in Jamaica, now married to Kerry, a wealthy woman who openly flirts with other men. Doug bets Brian that he couldn't "pick up" a new customer named Bonnie, a wealthy older woman. Brian accepts the challenge and wins Bonnie over. As they go back to Bonnie's room, Jordan sees them. Devastated, she takes a plane back to New York City. The next morning, Brian regrets sleeping with Bonnie. He goes to find Jordan but learns that she's gone. Doug teases Brian about the situation but Brian decides to upstage Doug by returning to New York with Bonnie. He reluctantly assumes the role of kept- boy and grows annoyed by her lifestyle. They have a blow-up during an art exhibit when Brian gets into a fight with the artist. Brian and Bonnie break up. Brian shows up at the diner where Jordan works. She rejects his flirting but agrees to listen to his apology after work. They talk but Brian keeps saying the wrong things. Then, to his surprise, she tells him she is pregnant with his child, and tells him to leave. He decides to prove to her that, despite being a bartender, he would make a worthy father. Brian learns that her family is wealthy, and goes to her parents' Park Avenue penthouse to speak with her. Jordan's father attempts to buy Brian off, but he refuses the money. Jordan refuses his advances, not wanting to be hurt again. Brian meets up with Doug, who confides that his wife's money is nearly gone, lost in the commodities market. Doug is unwilling to admit to his bride the precarious position they are in. Later, Kerry makes Brian take her home when Doug is too drunk to do so. Once inside her apartment, she attempts to seduce him. Brian stops it from going any further out of respect for his friendship with Doug. Kerry is angry at being rejected and calls Brian a coward. Brian goes to check on Doug and discovers he has slashed his throat and wrists with a broken bottle. After the funeral, Kerry sends Brian a letter, which is revealed to be Doug's suicide note. Brian realizes that Doug killed himself because his life was a sham. Reeling from losing his friend to suicide, he returns to Jordan's parents' home and begs her again for forgiveness. He tells her that Doug killed himself because he was too proud to ask for help and that Brian doesn't want to make the same mistake. He promises to take care of her and their child. Brian and Jordan leave together, with her father pledging not to give a dime to the couple. Brian and Jordan get married and have their wedding reception at his Uncle Pat's bar in Queens. Uncle Pat lends Brian the money to open a neighborhood bar called "Flanagan's Cocktails & Dreams." Brian finally achieved his dream of running his own bar. At the Grand Opening, Jordan reveals that she is pregnant with twins. Brian offers free drinks to celebrate, much to his Uncle Pat's chagrin. 

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